Different
by CaptainPop
Summary: A party at Carly's starts a discussion on relationships, labels and definitions.
1. Sam's Tub Time

It's not strange…it's just different…

The party had been going full swing for what seemed like forever. It filled the main floor and bled up to the second and third levels, spilling into the iCarly studio. The music was loud enough for the party and just below the threshold of neighbor annoyance. But, still way too loud for most conversations.

Mood lighting had replaced the stark overheads throughout the main floor. Lamps covered in red and yellow and purple silks, a few soft lamps here and there, and a strobe on top of the television. It was dim enough to meld everyone together intimately, but lit enough to keep just below an R rating.

Sam had retreated to the bathroom in Carly's bedroom for a breather, stretched out in the tub with a soft drink in hand and a blow party favor hanging out of her mouth. She absently blew out a kazoo note and watched the favor roll out stiff with her breath, then took a breath in as it rolled back up. It was distracting and amusing at the same time.

The door opened and music from the bedroom speakers rushed in with the redhead in the short dress and black nylons. It muted when she shut the door again. She went to the mirror and started checking her makeup. Sam watched as the girl spotted Sam in the corner of the mirror.

"Hey!" she said, way to brightly.

Sam raised a hand slightly to the girl. "Hey. What up?" she replied in her detached manner.

The girl started touching up her makeup in the mirror while stealing a glance at Sam. "You're that Sam girl from iCarly."

Sam looked at the ceiling and blew at the favor, muttering around the mouthpart: "Sam I am."

"Yeah. I've seen you around school, too. You and Carly."

"Cool," Sam muttered, hoping this chick was departing soon. She was interfering with her chillax time.

The girl paused with doing her makeup, lip gloss stick almost to her lips, and looked directly at Sam in the mirror. "So, when did you know you were lesbian?"

It was said so off hand that it took Sam by surprise. She stopped in mid blow, the favor semi-erect and then slowly rolling back to her mouth. "What? I'm not a lesbian."

The girl turned around and leaned against the sink counter. "Oh. I thought that you and Carly were an item."

"We are. We're a couple," Sam answered plainly, eyebrow crooked.

"Okay…?" the girl returned, confused.

"We're not lesbians. I don't even like girls." Sam leaned her head back and chewed the kazoo tip in her mouth.

"But…you like Carly…" Inquiry?

"Yeah," Sam slowly agreed, smiling to herself and looking at nothing on the ceiling, drifting into private thoughts.

"And, Carly's a girl." Statement.

"So?" Sam curled an eyebrow, focusing back on this strange conversation.

"_You're_ a girl." Fact.

"Obviously." Sarcasm.

"And, you're both together…" Leading…

Sam turned her head to stare at the girl, both brows down, almost glaring: "You gettin to some kinda point here?"

The girl was smiling: "Doesn't that make you gay?"

"How do you work that out?" Sam shot back, raising an eyebrow in curiosity.

"You," she said. "And Carly," she said. "Together," she finished.

Sam nodded slowly, as if expecting a revelation was coming soon. "Uh-huh…"

"Kissing…"

"Continue."

"Sleeping together…"

"I'm with you…" Sam nodded.

"And you're girls…"

"We've established that."

She shrugged: "That kinda defines lesbianism."

Sam shrugged: "How so?"

"Stubborn." The girl turned back to the mirror and finished applying lip gloss.

"No chiz," Sam chuckled, leaning back again.

Eyes looked at Sam again in the mirror. "Why do you think that you're not gay?"

Sam looked back at her. "Why do you think that I am?"

She stopped and stared incredulously at Sam: "Because of you and Carly being together."

"And that makes us gay?"

"Well, the kissing and hugging and sleeping together do."

Sam leaned back again, closed her eyes and blew the favor out and in a few times, deep in thought. Well, as deep as she usually thought about most intense subjects. Or topics that have dragged on as long as this. The kazoo hummed out, inhaled in, hummed out, and inhaled in. You know, topics like this tended to bore her. Actually, most topics bored her. You know, she bored rather easily, really. She was rather bored right now.

She climbed out of the tub, set the glass of pop on the edge of the sink and went to the door. Her eyes had that half-lidded bored dull look to them. She opened the door to the music and people.

"Where are you going?" the annoying girl asked.

Sam didn't stop as she moved out the doorway, tossing back: "To get some ham. I'm hungry."


	2. Carly Sees Red

_Mwah!_

**Back atcha!**

_^v^_

**(-^.^)--(^.^-)**

_Aww. Where U_

**Kitch**

_?_

**Ham**

_Figgers_

**-_- **_**U?**_

_Studio_

**K. B 2U Shrtly**

_Bring chips!_

**Costya**

_Let ya -x- me_

**No doubt… 8D**

Carly closed the lid of her phone and put it back on the hip of her earth tone brown and yellow plaid skirt, pulling her dark lavender sweater down over it. She sank into the bean bag and fell back into the competing voices around her in the iCarly studio. Music videos from the web were up on the big swing out monitor and thumping out of the surround sound speakers. The color strobes on the ceiling added to the normal lighting and gave the room a more relaxed party atmosphere.

Some people were standing in small groups, laughing and moving to the music. Some were sitting on floors, on one of the other two bean bags, and the landing step. She saw the geek squad around Freddy at his laptop station. Wow. That was an unkind thought. Sam must be rubbing off on her.

Carly grinned a dark, private grin and chuckled to herself. Rubbing…

The vacant beanbag next to her gave a whoosh as someone plopped down on it. She turned and expected to see Sam, her mouth opening with a smart comment. She stopped, mouth agape, when she saw the redheaded stranger sitting there, looking at her quizzically.

"Um, hello…"Carly said in recovery, managing a smile. The girl was nice looking, she thought. Nice hair down around her shoulders. Coppery red. Brown eyes, though. She thought redheads had green eyes? And that's a nice shade of lipstick. Wonder if Sam would like that?

"You're Carly, right?" the redhead said, way too brightly.

Carly's eyebrows flew up at the intensity and she leaned back slightly. "Ye-ah," she answered, hesitantly.

"Thought so! I've seen you and Sam around school." She waggled her head and rolled her eyes. "AND of course, iCarly."

"Of course…" Carly nodded, smiling. Wow. What was this girl on? "Enjoying the party?"

The girl looked around the room to either side of her, as if this was the entire party, nodding: "Yeah, it's great." She suddenly fixed Carly with a serious look and spoke in a hushed tone, leaning in closer. "Do you consider _yourself_ gay?"

Carly leaned further away as this girl leaned in to say her piece, making Carly's eyebrows shoot up even higher, if that was even possible. "Ah-umm…" her shaky voice answered, nervously. She tried to look seriously at the girl. "Do _you?_"

"Yes," she said, nodding emphatically. "Absolutely. I mean," and she hushed her voice again, "it's rather obvious, don't you think?"

Carly nodded and then shook her head, making her look like a bobble head, not really sure how to answer this question. "Sorry…?" was all she managed, sounding confused.

She nodded: "The gay thing."

Yeah, that explained everything… "Um…okay." Nope. Carly was lost here.

"So," the redhead began again. "Do you?"

Carly shook her head. "I don't like to judge…" her voice trailed away, looking around for Sam to save her from whatever this was that she needed saving from.

The girl giggled. "You're funny. I like that." She smiled and bounce-danced in the beanbag, watching the music videos.

Carly discreetly pulled out her phone, flipped the lid and typed: _?RU_

**Stairs**

_ResQ me!_

**Tryin. Kinda hard 2**

_Y?_

**Gotta stop 2 put stuf dwn**

_Y?_

**Sum crazy chick keeps txt me.**

_Erp!_

She closed her phone and put it away. Then, Carly began to relax a bit. That may have been a mistake.

The girl whirled around at Carly: "So! Do you like any other girls?" Eyes bright and wide, as if that loaded question was just _oh so innocent._

Carly stiffened and her voice quivered: "Wh-at?"

She shrugged quick and looked around the room. "There's a lot of pretty girls here." She fixed Carly with her big eye stare, cocking her head to the side. "Ever check them out?"

"I…" Carly gulped. She furrowed her brow, "Do you?"

The redhead waggled her head as she shook it. "No. Maybe what they're wearing. But, then, I'm not gay."

"Oh. You aren't?" Carly thought she had said that she was, for some reason. This conversation was beginning to hurt her head. "I thought you were."

"Unh-unh." She looked quizzically at Carly. "I thought lesbians had a sort of gay-dar?"

Carly's turn to give the big eye stare, eyebrows and all. "Uhhh…I'm not gay."

"Really!" Exclamation. Surprise. Disbelief? "I thought that you and Sam were together?"

Slowly, as if treading in a minefield… "We are…"

"Isn't Sam a girl?"

_No duh!_ Carly nodded, cautiously.

"Well, maybe you just never thought of her as a _girl_…," the redhead said, almost as a verbal thought.

Carly opened her mouth and shut it just as fast. Oh good God! She's right. Sam wasn't just another girl. She was…well, she was Sam. She was better than a girl. Carly smiled. She was better than a guy.

"So," yeah, she was still gabbling… "That seems gay, to me. By definition, I mean."

Carly sighed and launched herself out of the bean bag, standing and tugging down the hem of her skirt. This conversation was going to get weird and confusing again. "Yeah…maybe," Carly said, trying to sound distracted. "I gotta go. Freddy's waving me over…"

The redhead looked at Freddy, brow furrowed when she saw the boy was totally engrossed with his geeky friends at the laptop cart. "He is…?"

"Yeah…you missed it." Carly gave her a sad expression as she began to realize that maybe a lot of wind passed between those ears. "Enjoy the party…bye." And she quickly moved for Freddy, who was moving for the elevator and she felt redheaded eyes following her from behind.

Carly switched directions and followed Freddy onto the lift. He looked happy to see her, then frowned at the nervous face she had. She reached across him and punched the down button for the kitchen.

As the door lowered, he opened his mouth to say something.

Carly cut him off: "Na-ah-ah-ah!" Her hand went up to signal stop. "Too much talking. Quiet time!"


	3. All Sam and a Bag of Chips

"Oh. That chick is sooooo dead to me…"

Sam had stopped just inside the doorway to the studio holding two glasses of Peppy Cola with ice and a big bag of bacon flavor chips in her teeth, which were, at the moment, clenched very tightly. Her eyes were locked on the brown eyes of the annoying redhead half turned in the beanbag by the studio swing out monitor and watching Sam. With a big smile on her face that seemed to have grown even larger upon noticing Sam. If that was even possible.

A feral growl erupted from deep within Sam's body.

The geeks right next to her grew as nervous as crippled antelope around a starving lioness, eyes bugging out and backing themselves away from her line of sight. They eyed each other and pushed and jostled to try and single out their weakest member for sacrifice to the golden haired jungle cat.

But, Sam's attention was on a pest, not prey. Prey that was now on her feet and swaying slowly across the floor to where she stood, hands occupied with drinks. Maybe she could throw one at her. Surely, Carly would understand a little bloodshed, being Sam and all. Yeah, no.

"Sam!" she beamed.

"Uhg…" was all Sam could manage to grunt behind the bag of chips in her mouth, eyes hard, brow low, head tilted slightly down, glaring out from under her brows, fierce, teeth showing.

She stopped and looked at the two drinks, smiling as bright as a sunlamp. "Is one of those for Carly?"

WAY too perky. She must die. She must die now.

"You just missed her," the redheaded pest said. "She went down the elevator with Freddy."

Eh? Strike that. Freddy must die, too. Can't kill Carly. Love her. Wait. _Do I?_ Yeah, but she's sure as hell making this up to me._ Reminder to self:_ slap Fredwad around a bit before I kill him.

"Did she." Sam managed growl out around the bag in her teeth.

Little miss perky grabbed the bag in Sam's mouth and gave a tug, but it was firmly gripped by her teeth. Sam's neck did not even strain or budge with the pull. The twit tugged again a second time, giving Sam a look of…humor?

"What are you doing?" Sam said through clenched teeth.

"Helping," she said, cocking her head to the side with a smile, still holding onto the bag in both hands. "You don't like it when people offer to help you."

"I never need help," Sam growled, thrusting the two drinks into red-pest's chest, forcing her to grab them in her hands, freeing the bag in Sam's mouth. "Here!"

The redhead giggled as she took possession of the two sweating glasses of pop, looking from one to the other.

Sam slowly shook her head and took her phone out of her pocket, flipping the lid. It had buzzed in her pocket. Not nearly long enough to lift her mood, though. She looked at the screen: 1 Text Message.

**I in kitch.**

_With nub._

**How u no?**

_I in studio._

**So?**

_Guess. B(_

**Erp!**

_Tell nub 2 run_

**Y?**

_Mama coming_

**Erp!**

Sam snapped the lid shut and stowed the phone away. She took the chip bag from her mouth and glared with narrow eyes at the redhead, who was now watching her with amusement. Sam's hand tightened around the chip bag.

"Why are you here?" Sam demanded.

Redhead looked at the both glasses in her hands, mouth twisted in thought. "Is Carly coming back?"

Sam blinked, mentally stepping back a foot. "What?" she said, sharply. This chick was a couple donuts shy of a dozen.

The girl looked up at Sam again. "You have her drink." She giggled. "Actually, I guess_ I_ have her drink…and yours, too…"

Wow. Someone ate the donuts and left the sprinkles.

Sam smiled a fake smile. "Do me a favor?"

Redhead nodded with enthusiasm.

"Hold them for me and wait…right…here…k?" Sam's face fell to her dead look. She turned around and headed out the door, for the stairs, to go down to the kitchen, to kill a nub. After slapping him around a bit.

The chip bag exploded open with a pop in her grip.


	4. Someone's In The Kitchen With Carly

"Who is she?"

Carly was leaning against the sink counter, arms crossed over her chest, head shaking and eyes wide. She held her phone in her left hand and a glass of half drunk water in her right. She was still trying to figure that question out.

"I don't know, Freddy," she said in exasperation, sighing. "I thought she was Sam and then she was this redhaired inquisitor who got all in my face and kept asking me if I was gay."

Freddy frowned and said slowly: "Why?"

She gave him a look of confusion. "I don't know! There was something not quite right with her." Carly was speaking quickly and with that pissed off voice she used when she was…pissed off. "I mean…do I _look_ gay to you, Freddy?"

"Um…right now or in my dreams?" Freddy grinned.

"Not helping!" Carly glared.

Freddy put up his hands, defensively, laughing. "Sorry, Carly. No. You don't look gay." He smirked. "Not even when you're tickling tongues with Sam…"

She gave him a withering Carly look.

Her phone buzzed. She set down the water and opened the lid to her phone. Looked confused. Texted back. The phone buzzed. She read, still confused. Sent a text. The phone buzzed. She read. Her eyebrows shot off her head. Oh, yeah…the redhead. Oops. She texted back. The phone buzzed again. She read. She glanced at Freddy who was watching her. His eyebrow went up questioningly. She sent a text. The phone buzzed back fairly quickly. She answered and slowly closed the lid.

"Um, Freddy…" she began quietly.

"Yeah…" he answered, slowly.

"You know how Sam promised to behave tonight and not torment you?"

Freddy gulped. He could see where this was going. He stiffened somewhat. The way she said it was the same way that they tell the token victim in a horror movie to remember how they said everything was safe and there was no chainsaw-wielding homicidal maniac in the woods with them but really there was and he was right behind him.

"You might want to consider running…" Carly began.

Freddy turned. Spun really. Panic in his eyes. And froze.

Sam stormed around the corner, into the kitchen and right up to Freddy. She stopped about two feet from him, gave Carly a withering, narrow eyed look of her own, and then focused her attention back on Freddy. She pushed the empty bag of chips into his chest. He gripped it in both hands like it was a puppy or a shield. Or a puppy shield. And he flinched, eyes shut, waiting for the impact.

Sam just stared at him, unmoving.

Freddy opened his eyes, hesitantly. First one, then the other. Sam was looking at him with those sleepy, detached, bored eyes. Patient? He relaxed a bit. Sam never moved. He relaxed more. Maybe he was safe and Sam was sticking to her promise – OW!!

Sam brought her hand up so fast he never saw it coming as the flat of her hand made contact with the backside of his head in a slap that knocked his head forward.

"What was that for?" Freddy groaned, head bowed, rubbing the side of his skull.

"Because I can't hit Carly," Sam snapped.

As he lifted his head up, a bit dazed, her other hand flicked his forehead. He eyed her with a questioning tilt to his face.

"That was for making me wait," Sam said, evenly.

"Sam…" Carly chastised.

"Aw…he's a nub." Sam moved into Carly's folded arms, pulling them open and placing them around her waist. Then, she hugged Carly's body to hers. "Ah…that's better. Now…" she raised an eyebrow and gave her girlfriend a casual stare. "Would you like to tell Mama about the chick in the red hair?"


	5. Shut Up and Kiss Me

"Are we lesbians?"

Sam felt a tingle with Carly's breath at her right ear as she spoke. A slow grin spread across her face. She kept her eyes closed and enjoyed the vanilla scent of her lover's hair. Her hands tightened around Carly's waist, holding their bodies even closer, melding into one. They continued to rock back and forth and slowly turn to the romantic music playing in the main floor.

"You're gonna bring that up now?" Sam questioned in a murmur by Carly's ear.

Carly sighed in Sam's ear, which caused two things to happen. Sam shivered throughout her body and Sam had to accept that the brunette in her arms was going to analyze this to death. She sleepily opened her eyes as she felt Carly move away in her arms.

Carly moved her hands up to Sam's neck and leaned back enough to be face to face with the slightly shorter blond, scanning those grey eyes with so many flecks of hazel and green that she loved to stare at. She smiled and knew that she had everything she ever wanted in life right here in her arms.

Sam's half-lidded gaze took in the twinkle and intensity of Carly's eyes. Dark brown. Deep. Mysterious. Smokey. Hot. All these words flooded through Sam as she tried to describe what she saw, what she was feeling whenever she looked at her girlfriend. Like, _really_ looked.

Sam leaned in and up with her lips, hugging Carly close to her midsection, pinning her in place.

Carly moved her head back an inch and turned her face slightly. "Woah, speedy needy," she chastised, their voices low, intimate. A conversation just for them to hear.

Her eyebrows arching, Sam recovered her posture. She looked at her heart with humor and gave Carly the sad Puckett Pout, her lower lip jutting out. "What? No kisses for Mama?"

Carly chuckled. "You're so cute when you do that…"

Sam frowned. "You know, Shay, if anyone but you called me that, I'd deck 'em…" She looked around the living room for someone to punch. "Where's Freddy?"

"Be nice. He's keeping our pest busy so we can relax." Carly had asked Freddy to go upstairs and occupy the redhead so that they could have an uninterrupted dance together. He did it for Carly's sake, but she knew that a part of him did it for Sam, too.

"Riiight," Sam nodded. "I'll hit him later."

"No you won't, Sam," Carly insisted.

Sam raised an eyebrow. "Oh, really? And why is that?"

Carly smiled and gently placed her lips to the blonde's, feeling the softness that was there, lightly biting Sam's lower lip as her tongue traced a line across it, letting her lips suck on the plumpness of her lip as she moved her face away to look at Sam's eyes again. "Because you'll be far too busy…"

A shudder passed through Sam's body and she let a faint moan escape her lips. Her eyes shut and she let her head fall back. She stiffened as she felt the brunette's tongue touch the vee of her collarbone and slowly glide up along the skin on her throat to her raised chin. She felt Carly give a soft kiss to the tip of her chin. Sam released a long breath she had been holding. It was gonna be a wild ride.

Sam lowered her head to look at Carly with dark and hungry eyes. But, she was Sam and she never surrendered this easy. With a wicked grin, she said: "Who said I was spending the night?"

"Who said you got to choose?" Carly grinned back and moved her lips in closer, closing her eyes as she felt Sam's lips on her own.

This time, it wasn't a tease. This one was for real. Sam's lips responded to Carly's, hungry with an appetite that would not be easily satisfied. Their lips pressed together and Sam began to nibble at her lover's lower lip, gently sucking on the plump flesh, her teeth grazing the skin. She pressed her tongue against Carly's lips, seeking entry, pushing her way past any defenses. Knocking wasn't her style. Her cupcake parted her lips and welcomed Sam inside, greeting Sam's wet probe with her own tongue, dancing privately inside her mouth, caressing each other. Sam ran the tip of her tongue along the sensitive underside of Carly's and felt the girl press her body ever closer to Sam's, moaning, Carly's hands pulling Sam's neck hard against her face, almost as if she wanted Sam to devour her.

It was an eternity before Sam pulled back from the kiss and locked her eyes on her prey, scant inches apart. They were both breathing pretty heavy. Carly's eyes had gone very dark and cloudy, her eyes barely open, her breath ragged. Sam felt like she had run seven marathons, her chest heaving.

"Yeah…" Sam growled… "I'm spending the night…"


	6. Freddy Gets Fed to the Wolf

Freddy groaned.

How is it that he does the dirty work, but Sam gets the girl? Life is so unfair.

He walked into the iCarly studio and stopped. The music videos were still rocking from the monitor, but there were fewer people up here now. Maybe four. Including the redhead in the middle of the room, watching the videos, wiggling back and forth to the music, and still holding a glass of cola in each hand. Needless to say, his eyebrows were paying a visit to his forehead.

She turned to face him as he came around her left side and tapped her shoulder. "Hi there…"

The redhead grinned, eyes bright, and said excitedly: "You're Freddy!"

Freddy inched back a bit. Woah! Adjust the settings on your perk-o-meter… "Um…yeah. That would be me." After the previous conversations this chick had, he thought to add quickly: "But, I'm not gay. So, please don't ask…"

She tilted her head to the side and looked at him oddly. "Why would I do that?"

"There seems to be a lot of it going around tonight," he said to himself. Then, he nodded to the glasses in her hands and said a bit louder: "Um…you can probably put those down. Sam's not coming back."

Her mouth made a quiet: "Oh…" She looked down at the glasses in her hands, then back up at Freddy. "Does it bother you?"

Freddy frowned; brow furrowed, and gave her a sideways look, confused. "Glasses of pop?"

_Did she just giggle?_ "No, silly." _Yeah, she giggled._ "That Sam and Carly are," eye roll, "you know…confused."

_I think I'm looking at the only confused one here_… "Confused about what, exactly?"

She looked at him strangely, brows wrinkled. "About being gay."

"You seem really hooked up on that," Freddy said, plainly.

_And there she goes again with the giggles._ "I think they make a nice couple."

Freddy had to nod in agreement. "Yeah. Yeah, that they do."

She looked at him in thought for a moment and smiled at him, as if realizing something important. "It's nice that you're still their friend."

He gave her a questioning look. "Um…why wouldn't I be their friend?"

She shook her head in a waggle and rolled her eyes. "The gay thing, silly."

"Ugh," he ughed. "What gay thing?"

The redhead gave him a look that one would give an imbecile. He found this odd, coming from her. The thought about a pot and a kettle came to mind. She explained: "Sam and Carly. Most people wouldn't be so accepting."

"Do you do drugs?" he asked, seriously.

"No. Why? Are you asking me to?" Such wide and innocent eyes. _Lights on, but somebody took all the furniture._

Freddy mumbled to himself: "Maybe you should start…" Then, a bit louder: "No. Just a question."

"Oh. Random."

He said to himself, shaking his head slightly: "No. Not really…" Then, to her: "What's your interest in Carly and Sam?"

"What's yours?" she gave back.

"Hunh?" he hunhed?

"You seem to keep bringing them up," she fired back as another salvo.

He shook his head. "What--? I Don't--"

She leaned in a bit, keeping her voice a bit private, as if sharing an embarrassing secret. "It's ok. Jealousy does that to guys. Especially when they lose out to another woman…"

His eyebrows went for another ride up his head and he felt himself bristle: "I did _not_ lose out to another woman. I lost out to _Sam_." He shook his head as if to erase that statement. "I mean, I didn't lose out to anyone. I wasn't even _chasing_ Carly. Well, I _was_, but that was a while ago. If anything I lost out to Car—" It came out fast, like verbal diarrhea. He gave his head another shake and put his hands out flat in front of him, trying to start again. "Look. I'm not jealous."

Redhead eyed him, curiously. "Wow…you're a bit ditzy. No wonder they both went gay. You've got issues."

"_I got…??_" He was almost speechless. "I'm not the one asking if Carly and Sam are lesbians –"

"See…there you go _again_." She was _chastising_ him. She was chastising _him_! "Do you _ever_ talk about anything other than Sam and Carly? Freddy, you really should try to find yourself a nice girl and move on."

His mouth opened but nothing intelligible came out. "What? But… You… I… What?"

"I mean," she continued, "I don't think that chasing after lesbians is very healthy. Not if you're a guy."

Freddy was feeling a bit lost at this point. When did this conversation turn against him? "I'm not chasing after lesbians. Wait!" He shook his head. Ug, he was getting a headache from it. "They're _not_ lesbians. And I'm _not_ chasing them. I don't even want to _talk_ about them. I came up here to talk to _you_."

She cooed: "Aw…that's _so_ sweet." She giggled as she looked at him in the way your babysitter looks at you when you tell them that you want to marry them when you grow up. "I suppose you want to ask me out on a… you know…"

"A date?" Freddy finished, suddenly tired.

"Wow! That's so sudden. I don't really even know you. But, sure! Okay! That would be great. When?"

Wait! What? Did she just ask when? "When?" he repeated in surprise and confusion.

"Oh, I don't know… How about tomorrow night? I'll meet you at the Groovie Smoothie at 7 o'clock." The words just ran out of her mouth so quickly that Freddy's brain was having a hard time catching up.

"Ah…" his mouth moaned.

She looked at her watch. "Ooh! It's late. I gotta go. It was so nice to meet you, Freddy. I'll see you tomorrow night! Oh, here…" she pushed the glasses into his hands and he numbly took them. "One is Sam's and one is Carly's. Not sure which is which…"

_Do not go there, Fred._ "I'll…uh…I'll make sure they get them…"

Redheaded girl just smiled and twirled around him and vanished out the studio door, leaving him standing in utter shock, holding two glasses of pop and wondering what the hell just happened.

"I feel like a one legged man in an ass kicking contest…"


	7. Rub a Dub Dub

"We should get a pet."

Sam gave a tired, but happy, smile as she watched the big red balloon float over her head and slowly begin its descent. She lifted her left hand from the warm, soapy bubbles of the bath and tapped it lightly with her fingertips, sending it back up into the steamy air above the tub and toward Carly. Sam's right hand was busy massaging Carly's wet left foot which was resting on her lap, just beneath the water.

"We have one," she answered, matter-of-fact.

Carly wore the same pleased, but tired expression on her face, eyes open with heavy lids, wet hair pushed back on her head. Her eyes tracked the balloon as it neared her and floated down. She lifted her right hand from the edge of the tub by the wall and let her long slender fingers tap it in return to Sam.

She curled her eyebrow. "We do?"

Sam gave her a grin and an arched eyebrow in response.

Carly rolled her eyes. "Sam, Freddy is _not_ our pet."

"Okay, okay…" Sam conceded. "Then…a penguin." She tapped the balloon back to Carly with one hand while the thumb of her other hand began to work the arch of Carly's foot.

"Penguin?" Carly sighed. "That feels wonderful, by the way."

"Yeah. Penguin," Sam nodded, eyes half-lidded. "You _know_ I have magic fingers, babe."

Carly blushed hotly and gave Sam a wide eyed stare. "Sam!" At the last moment, she batted the balloon hard at Sam's face.

Grinning darkly, Sam easily deflected it into the air. "I'm a witchy woman, Cupcake…" As the balloon drifted down within reach she tapped it back at Carly.

"Be good," Carly scolded, grinning. She moved her right foot discreetly under the soapy water to a rather sensitive location and laughed as she saw Sam's eyes go wide in shock, then seem to glaze somewhat as a wry grin appeared on her lips.

Carly's foot had found the mark perfectly. It was a bit of a surprise when the girl's toes made contact with Sam's flesh just below her belly and glided ever so slowly down to more sensitive areas. Sam's breath felt a bit ragged as a shiver ran through her body. She held onto Carly's other foot a bit more tightly. Her eyes drew closed and she absorbed the feeling between her legs into her soul.

When she regained control of her body, Sam opened her eyes to Carly who was grinning and batting the balloon above her head. She had to clear her throat to make her voice work right. "You're not as innocent as you let on…"

Carly just continued to smile and watch the balloon, casually playing with it while her submerged foot moved in tiny circles. "So, why a penguin?"

A deep purr sounded from Sam. "…Everyone should have a penguin, Carls." She shifted a bit in the tub and, yeah, that was a much better angle.

"You comfortable, Sammy?" Carly gave her a lifted eyebrow and a toothy grin. "You look flustered…"

"Frobisher," was all Sam said, staring at the ceiling.

Carly wrinkled her brow. "What?"

"The penguin." Sam lowered her gaze to stare coolly and controlled at Carly, not a hint of fluster now on her face, her eyes half-lidded and detached, as if they were sitting on the sofa watching television. "I'd name it Frobisher."

A chuckle came from Carly as she shook her head at her girlfriend. Only Sam could regain her composure so quickly and behave like she wasn't being molested under the water while carrying on a completely unrelated conversation. But, she was satisfied that she had succeeded in cracking Sam's usually aloof exterior, if only for a moment. Although, Carly was quite certain that she would pay for this transgression later tonight.

Hopefully…

"You're nuts," Carly said.

"I prefer to think of it as rationally challenged," Sam returned. "You _know_, I can't let this little incident here go unpunished…"

Carly gave a pout. "Aw…is Sammy not happy with her little cupcake?"

Sam responded by tickling the bottom of Carly's foot, causing her to spasm in sudden giddy laugher and almost sink beneath the water, grabbing the edge of the tub to hold herself up, retracting both her feet and legs to her side of the tub. Sam had moved fast, in a rush of water, and was up against her, Carly's legs bent against her body with the weight of Sam's body on them. Sam's hands were on the edges of the tub by her shoulders and her face was moments from Carly's.

Sam's lips slowly drifted toward Carly's, their eyes locked. Carly was lost in those grey-green orbs and hungrily waited for the sensation of her Sammy's lips on hers, parting her mouth slightly, tilting her head.

A knock and the bathroom door opened. Sam froze. Carly sighed heavily and seemed to deflate. Sam's eyes looked dangerous. Carly shifted her eyes to look at the door.

"You need a watch, Freddy," she sighed. Sam groaned deep down within her soul.

"…what?" came a confused Freddy.

"Because your timing is impeccable," growled Sam. She moved back to her side of the tub and laid back, her head against the tub wall, turned to watch Freddy take a seat on the toilet. His shirt was stained with something purple. He looked sweaty and beat. "You know, the juice goes in your mouth, right?"

"What?" Freddy snapped at Sam.

Sam closed her eyes and faced Carly again. "Nice shirt, nub."

Freddy looked down at the big stain on his previously very nice dressy shirt. He looked at Sam with a withering look. "Nice tits, spawn of the unholy."

Sam opened her eyes, looked at Freddy, looked down at her two small breasts just bobbing above the water and smiled. "Why, yes, Frobisher. They certainly are."

Freddy looked from Sam to Carly with questioning. "Frobisher?"

Carly gave Sam a scolding look. "Sam, Freddy is not our pet…"


	8. I Want It Painted Black

"She's gonna hurt you."

Paradise was a comfy couch, comfy clothes, junk food, close friends, and endless reruns of Girly Cow. The lights were off and the only glow came from the flickering images on the wide panel television. Carly relaxed on her side of the sofa with her feet in fluffy bunny slippers stretched out on the coffee table which was littered with half empty glasses of cola, crumb filled plates that once held pizza slices and nachos, and a ham bone. She casually played with the blond curls on the head of the goddess snoring quietly in her lap with her right hand while her left rested on Sam's bare midriff. It was amazing that there was not an ounce of flab there to be felt. What she did feel was the amazing hardness of her ham lover's abs.

Sam was spread out on the sofa. Her head was nuzzling into Carly's lap, face turned into her belly, drool soaking into Carly's cotton PJs, snoring away in that adorable way she had. She was on her back, her bare legs extended across Freddy's lap where Carly watched him attending to the toes of Sam's bare feet.

Freddy looked up from Sam's toes to give Carly and crooked smile. "She may hurt me, but she'll have to chase me first. And, she's gonna look funny doing it."

Carly rolled her eyes and sighed. "One of these days I wish you would both just pull them out and finally see whose is bigger…"

Freddy opened his mouth to respond, paused a moment, screwed up his face and said: "I don't have a comeback for that." He returned to Sam's toes, chuckling to himself.

The right foot was done, as far as Carly could tell. Freddy was starting in on the left one. On the sofa between them lay the various bottles from her makeup kit Freddy had brought down from the bedroom earlier. This made her think he had been planning this since at least the bathtub incident. What a devious mind. Stupid, suicidal, masochistic, but very devious. Sam will respect that while she's pummeling him.

"I didn't know I still had those," Carly thought aloud. They seemed so gaudy now. When she bought them, something like four years ago, the colors seemed nicer. Now, she wasn't sure if she even wanted to admit they ever existed. She looked at Sam's toes with an assessing eye. Yeah, not her best moment in cosmetics shopping.

"I really had to dig for them," Freddy said, slowly as he concentrated on painting Sam's big toe Neon Green Grape. He gave it the attention of the Sistine Chapel's ceiling. "I remembered you used to wear it when you were thirteen and I know you never throw out makeup."

"You know, any other girl would find her male best friend rummaging around her makeup table for nail polish that he still remembered she wore years ago pretty odd," grinned Carly, twirling Sam's golden locks in her fingers and absently doing the same with her fingers over Sam's belly.

Freddy paused to look up at Carly with humor as he reached for Fuzzy Pink Watermelon. Then, silently, he bent to the task of painting the next toe.

Carly sighed.

The party had ended hours ago. It had been a real pre-Summer blowout to close the school year. Sam had wanted a celebratory bash to mark the occasion of two months filled with days of lazing around and late night smoothies. Tanning on the roof. Hanging at the mall. Vegging in front of the television.

Like now.

Carly gave a sleepy smile to the beautiful blond face lying in her lap. She was _so_ gonna hurt Freddy. Of course, the fact that she did nothing to stop Freddy or warn Sam would probably not go unnoticed. But, then, as far as facing the wrath of Sam went, Carly usually had diplomatic immunity. She only got a pouty face and a slap on the…um…wrist. Sure. Wrist.

"It was a great party," she said with a satisfied sigh.

"Fantastico!" Freddy beamed. He looked up suddenly with a frown. "Except that I now have a date with that insane redhead, thanks to you two."

Carly grinned, but gave Freddy the sympathy head tilt. "Sorry, Freddy." Then, she had a look of bewilderment come over her. "What was up with that chick?"

Halloween Black now. "She's sharper than she looks," he grumbled.

Carly was lost in thought. "Do you think she's right?"

Freddy looked up with a wrinkled brow. "Right about what?"

"That I'm, well, confused?" Carly said as she pondered the television show. "I'm with Sam but I wouldn't say I'm gay, exactly. I mean I don't stand around all day checking out other hot girls and say 'Hey, I wanna cover her in chocolate sauce and whipped cream and slowly lick it off to the music of romantic Cuttlefish ballads'…"

"Sorry?" Freddy wasn't sure where that stream of consciousness came from as it raced out of Carly's lips, but he followed the beginning before the end completely lost him. "Are you still bothered by what Red said?"

"No…" Carly answered slowly. Then, more firmly: "No. It's just. Well, I don't really know what we are, I guess." She looked confused.

"Best friends?" Freddy offered, switching to Pineapple Yellow. "Lovers? Girls trying to make Freddy go crazy?"

"Great," mumbled Sam from Carly's lap. "I wake up to Fredweiner talking. I'm gonna have nightmares for weeks."

Sam rolled her head to look up at Carly's face looking down at her with a welcoming smile. A slow grin of peace spread over Sam's face. Then, confusion as something didn't feel quite right. Something to do with her feet. Someone was playing with her feet and as she was in Carly's lap, she was pretty certain it wasn't her. That only left…

"Fredifer." Sam voice said that she was not pleased.

Sam looked down the short length of her body to find Freddy sitting on the other end of the sofa with her bare feet perched on his lap and an open bottle of yellow nail polish in one hand, an applicator brush in the other. The look in his face as he returned her look was a mix of fear and surprise. Mostly fear. Simply priceless.

Her gaze slowly lowered from Freddy to her toes. And stopped. She raised a single eyebrow and casually wiggled her toes, her face fixed with an impassive expression that was impossible to read. Each toenail was a different ugly color vomited up by a demented rainbow. Except for the last two on her left foot. Freddy had not yet painted those.

She laid her head back and looked up at a sheepishly grinning Carly. "You knew about this," Sam began evenly. "And, you let him do it," she said dangerously slow and steady. "While I was sleeping." She narrowed her eyes and gave Carly a dark glare until Carly had to look away.

Carly had turned her head to look at something that suddenly seemed very interesting over in the darkened kitchen, trying to ignore the daggers coming from her lap.

Sam lifted her head and turned her dark eyes back to Freddy with her disinterested look, catching his eyes and flicking her eyes down at her toes and back up at his eyes.

"You missed two, Fredwina." Then, Sam closed her eyes and laid her head back to relax again in Carly's lap. "Annoy me when you're done."

"Why?" nervously asked a wary Freddy.

"So I can hurt you, obviously," she answered obviously.

Freddy looked at Carly who was looking back at him. She gave a shrug. Freddy shrugged. Then, he returned to finish what he had already started, chuckling to himself.

Sam raised a hand up to Carly's face as she was preoccupied with the painting of Sam's toes. She put her forefinger to thumb and flicked Carly's nose, instantly snatching her attention.

"Ow!" Carly's hand went right to her nose, rubbing. "Hey…!"

"Study his technique well…," Sam deadpanned.

Carly held her hand to her nose and looked down at Sam, not sure she wanted to know: "Um…why…?"

Sam closed her eyes, smiling to herself: "Who do you think will be repainting my toes to a more Sam-approved color after I break both his arms…?"


	9. Purple Pain

"Purple is a _Sam-approved_ color??"

Sam looked up from her Tornado DS at Carly sitting cross-legged at her feet on the end of the bed. Sam was sitting with her back propped up on three pillows against the headboard and her legs bent up toward her so that her feet were flat on the bed toward Carly. Carly had her head down to the task of repainting Sam's multi-colored toenails.

"What's wrong with purple?" she asked, sounding a bit hurt that anyone would challenge her color selection.

Carly looked up at the tone and found Sam's trademark impassive gaze meeting her. She gave a twist of her lips and bent her brow, not sure how to take the blond. "Nothing's wrong with purple, Sam. I just didn't know _you_ liked purple."

Sam shrugged and went back to concentrating on her game. "I don't."

"Then, why am I painting your toes purple…?" Carly was a bit confused.

Without looking up from her game of Marion and Louisie Kendo, Sam answered, slightly distracted: "Cuz…you _do_…" Sam moved her thumbs in rapid action against the buttons as she twisted her upper body to avoid Louisie's sword attack, and then smiled as she defeated the little electrician in green coveralls. She glanced up at Carly: "That makes it a Sam-Approved color."

Carly shook her head. "You puzzle me sometimes."

Sam grinned. "Read the bottle."

"Purple Pain Nail Polish…" Carly rolled her eyes. "Ok. Ok."

Putting the game on pause, Sam parted her legs at the knees to better see Carly and inspect the work being done on her toes. "You done yet?"

"…Allll-moooosssst," Carly drew out, as she applied the finishing touches to the last baby toe. She sat back to admire her work and smiled. "Pretty."

There was an intense clearing of a throat. "Ahem?"

Carly jerked her head up fast, grinning. "Oops, did I say 'pretty'? I meant to say…'girly'…" She laughed and jumped up from the bed to the floor, ready to run for the safety of the bathroom.

Sam rolled off the bed and onto her feet like a ninja with cat-like grace and took three fast strides toward Carly. Sadly, Carly's legs had gone slightly numb from sitting cross-legged on the bed for so long and lacked the necessary coordination to outrun the tigress chasing her. Sam easily caught her prey in a tight hug, wrestling her down to the floor, onto her back with Sam sitting on her pelvis, holding Carly's wrists to her knees in her unbreakable grip.

"I'm sorry, _dinner_," Sam growled, with a cocked eyebrow and a twinkle in her eye. "I'm not sure I heard that right…"

"Sam, get off me!" Carly laughed, struggling and twisting, but absolutely unable to budge the demon tigress.

Sam looked off to the side, as if pulling something from the air. "I believe that you meant to say _pretty_…" and she looked down at her prey pinned beneath her with a grin, "_fierce_."

"Sure," Carly giggled. "Fierce…" She tried to look serious. "I meant to say _fierce_…" and failed as she started to laugh, "…for a pretty girl…"

That did it. Sam moved in for the kill. Her hands went to Carly's sides, her ticklish zone, and she tormented her with dancing fingers. The brunette bucked and twisted beneath her and Sam was actually finding it a challenge to keep her seat on this ride.

Her hands freed, Carly was able to summon the strength to twist and push Sam off of her and they rolled to the floor laughing and giggling and somehow hugging each other and ended up with Sam's lips on her own in a deep and passionate embrace. Good God, how she loved being taken down by this blond tigress.

It was several minutes before their lips parted and they lay together on the floor, on their sides facing each other, firmly held by arms that never wanted to let go. They stayed like that for an eternity, warm brown eyes gazing into passionate grey-green orbs, sharing their breath as they melded their bodies, each absorbing love from the other.

Carly furrowed her eyes as a thought suddenly occurred to her. "Sam…"

"Yeah...?" Sam answered, slowly, a confused look on her face.

"Do you love me?"

"Of course I do," Sam replied without hesitation, still wondering where this was heading, though suspecting she already knew.

Carly eyed Sam carefully as she said: "_How_ do you love me…?"

Sam sighed heavily and got up to her feet, detaching herself from Carly. "Not this again," she grumbled and went into the bathroom. "Way to kill a moment, Shay…"

Rolling onto her belly, Carly watched Sam through the open doorway as the blond started to get ready for bed, spreading paste on her toothbrush. That was a good sign. When Sam brushed her teeth at bedtime, it meant that sleep was not high on her priority list. Carly knew she should just let it go for the night. That would be the right thing to do. Forget about it until later. Maybe, she could bring it up at breakfast. It was only a couple hours away. It could wait.

"Are we…what _are_ we, Sam?" Carly pleaded. Nope, she wasn't getting any tonight…why didn't she just shut up…

"Min uv ith eesh offer," Sam shouted through a toothbrush and foaming paste, staring down at her from the sink.

Carly slowly got to her feet and went into the bathroom to lean against the sink counter beside Sam. "Wanna try that again?"

Sam grabbed the sleeve of Carly's right arm and wiped her mouth. She gave her a tired look. "No."

"Ew, Sam!" Carly wiped off toothpaste foam with her free hand as Sam returned to the bedroom.

Carly began to spread paste on her own brush and ran the water in the sink. "I just think we need to be clear on what we are," she spoke over the sound of the water in the sink. "I'm not trying to label us, Sam. I just want to know where we stand."

There was no response from Sam.

"I know I only have eyes for you, Sammy," Carly started, wincing at the cliché. "I love you and I want to be with you. I know that. But, are we lesbians? What are we to each other? Just friends with benefits? Bi? Experimenting? Confused?" She held the brush to her mouth. "I know you love me, Sam. I don't doubt that at all. I just want to know how we define ourselves. I want to know that you're not confused about us." She started brushing her teeth, straining to hear a reply.

When no reply came, even after Carly had finished brushing her teeth, she knew then that it was going to be a rough night. And she cursed herself for being too compulsive in her need to organize everything into categories. She loved Sam and Sam loved her. That should be enough. But was it, really? They shared each other's bed, their bodies, and their hearts. But, where would they be in five years? Still together? Would they decide that they were better as friends? Would they each find someone else?

They weren't gay. They didn't ogle other girls. They still found guys hot. They just seemed to click better together than with anyone else. That didn't make them gay. Bisexual, maybe. Experimental? Possibly. Confused? She had to think for a moment. Carly shook her head. There was no way in Hades that she was confused about her feelings for Sam.

Carly finished getting ready for bed and exited the bathroom. "I'm sorry to keep going on about this, Sam. Just forget it. I love you. That's – "

But, she was talking to an empty room.


	10. Sam Returns

What had she done?

Carly had tossed in her big, empty bed for the umpteenth time as the sun had slowly come up and the room became brighter. To say that she had slept well would be a lie. To say that she had felt rested would also be a lie. To say that she – oh, just stop lying!

She rolled onto her side, facing the window, and felt the place her Sammy usually occupied and felt lonely without her. After weeks of waking up next to her almost every morning, Carly found it odd for the blond to not be there. Sam has walked out and had not returned.

The calls and texts Carly had sent to her girlfriend's phone had gone unanswered. After trying for an entire hour and being met with silence, she finally got the point. She shut off the lights and went to bed. Then, she waited quietly in the fading darkness for Sam to return to her.

Sam was ignoring her. That meant that she was mad. Very mad. She never ignored Carly. Ever. Even when Sam was mad or upset, she would still answer Carly's calls and texts. Always.

Carly had never questioned their relationship. There had never been any reason to question anything. There really wasn't anything to question now. Why had this become such an issue for her, then? Maybe it was just her. Yeah. It was just her. Neurotic Carly. She should have _that_ tattooed on her forehead like a warning tag: _Lookout: Contents subject to unreal expectations of perfection!_

That brought to mind something she had wanted to do with Sam. Not now, but when they got older. Spencer would have a fit if his little sister did it now. She had wanted them to get matching tattoos. Something romantic. Entwined roses (too girly), two linked female symbols (too gay), or two pieces of a single heart – one on Carly's heart; the matching one on Sam's heart. But, in the end, it was all too cliche. Sam and Carly had a different relationship and it deserved something different, a symbol that was unique to them.

Wouldn't have mattered much, anyway. Sam absolutely hated and despised tattoos. Or body markings of any kind. She had made it totally clear that there was no way in the land of heavenly bacon and Fat Cakes that she would allow her precious body to be defaced by permanent graffiti. She lived by the adage: _No identifiable markings._

That was probably a Puckett family motto, emblazoned on a coat of arms right up there with a set of handcuffs, a judge's gavel and prison stripes.

So, Carly never brought up the subject of tats or piercings again. Maybe that suppressed need for identity actually bugged her, deep down. Latent feelings that were bubbling to the surface. Did she mean so little to Sam that the idea of even a tiny symbol of Carly on her skin, on her body, repulsed her? It hurt that she would not even discuss it.

Angry. Carly decided on _that _emotion. She let it rise up inside of her. After all, what right did _Sam_ have to get so upset and walk out. All Carly was asking was for some token display of their relationship. Proof that she meant more to Sam than anything else in the world. That, no matter what, they would always be a part of each other, together.

Carly wasn't asking to be labeled. Nothing other than as _Sam's girlfriend_. Something that identified her as important to Sam, more important that her own skin.

The bedroom door clicked and opened, closing quietly a moment later. Just long enough for someone to enter the room. Carly whipped around in her bed to glare at the blond tip-toeing across the carpet between them.

Sam froze at the look of anger on Carly's face. This was going to be unpleasant. She straightened up and looked contrite. Waiting. She deserved it, she knew. Whatever she got, she deserved it. She should never have just left, but she had nothing to say. Words were never her thing. And she was certain they would fail her now.

Carly did not disappoint her. She was up from the bed and stormed over to stand toe-to-toe with the shorter blonde before Sam could even think about bolting.

"What the hell, Sam?!" she exploded, arms flailing to her sides, like flapping accentuated her point. "You crawl in here after vanishing all night without a single word, coming home looking like...like..." Looking at Sam derailed her thoughts and melted away her anger. It was her eyes. Always her piercing gray-green eyes. Eyes so soft and petulant and twelve kinds of gorgeous.

"Aw, hell," Carly mumbled to herself, slightly annoyed that her mood was so easily drained from her.

"Carly, I --" Sam began, slowly.

With a single finger to Sam's lips, Carly effectively quieted the blond goddess. Damn it, Sam looked good to her. She _always_ looked good. Even when she looked bad, Sam looked hot – I mean good, she amended. No, she re-amended, I mean hot...

"Sam, it's okay," Carly whispered, surrendering like she always did. "I'm the one who hurt _you_. I'm the one with the issues. I really don't know why you even put up with me."

Sam shrugged, noncommittally. "I was just gonna say that I wasn't crawling." She saw Carly give her a confused, slightly cool look. "I walked in." Sam saw Carly's eyes dim. Damn it. Why did she have to open her mouth. She should just kiss her. Yeah, action, not words. That was her way.

Carly sighed. Why had she expected Sam to take anything she said or felt seriously. That would take a level of commitment that she realized Sam would never have. With anything. Tattoos included. It would always be this way, she knew. Sam would always ignore anything serious. Anything that interfered with her impulsive nature. Sam had always said that it was one of her charms.

It really was quite annoying.

"Carly," Sam began again, quietly. "I left because I didn't know what to say that I haven't said a thousand times. You know I'm no good with words..." Her voice trailed off as Carly's eyes turned chilly.

"So...you just _left?_" Carly's voice was harsh and there was a rising anger again. "Not just left. _Vanished_. Obviously, your actions do your speaking, Sam. They've always spoken for you. You couldn't even be bothered to answer your phone? I sent you a gazillion texts, Sam. Am I so unimportant to you that you couldn't even respond to at least _one_ of them?" Carly was at shouting level. "Well, I guess I got my answer, Sam! I guess I really know how you feel about us! Just what we are to each other! _Thanks_," she said that last word particularly cold, eyes blazing, burning.

There was a dead silence between them. Carly was doing her best to calm down and regulate her breathing, hands balled into fists at her sides. Sam just stared at the ground. She had said enough. She didn't want to risk anymore words. Carly was mad enough. Maybe too mad.

Finally, Carly spoke. When she spoke, her voice was deflated and flat, quiet: "Sam...just go. Please, just...go..."

Sam felt a mixture of confusion and hurt and pain and a whole lot of negative emotions she did not like. And she could think of nothing to say to fix this. Actions. She walked around Carly and grabbed her jacket from the back of Carly's desk chair where she had left it. She returned to Carly and pulled the dead phone out of the jacket pocket, displaying it to Carly, showing that she never even had it with her. The battery had died.

Carly looked at the dead phone as if it was insignificant. There were other issues here.

Sam decided to act again. She raised her hands to Carly's arms, moving to pull her into a hug. Carly was almost relenting, but a flash in her eyes made her stand her ground. She knocked away Sam's arms and gave a solid push to Sam's chest to punctuate her point.

Carly's eyes went wide and she froze, staring at the blond with the downcast eyes. It was there, she saw it, almost perceptible for an instant and then gone. Only Carly would have caught it and knew what it was. Sam had _flinched_, winced when Carly had pushed on her chest. Sam _never_ flinches.

_Ever._

Carly slowly approached Sam. Sam stood her ground and studied the carpet. Words had failed. And now, so too did her actions. She stood immobile, waiting for it. Carly's hand touched the spot on Sam's left breast where her hand had been moments earlier. Sam didn't move. Carly's fingers found the edge of the shirt collar. Sam's eyes slowly came up to meet Carly's with an intensity she had never seen before, as if there was something deathly urgent she needed to tell her. Carly's eyes fell to where her fingers pulled at the collar, tugging it down. And she saw blackened skin, the edge of a bruise. Her eyes flitted up at Sam's and Carly looked confused. She looked back at the bruise, slowly being exposed by her fingers until she saw it.

She felt bad and relieved and excited all at once. Sometimes, actions do speak louder than words. Sam's actions were like screaming through a bullhorn. When she needed to say something, when Sam actually put her mind to it, her actions made her intentions quite clear.

There it was. Purple. In the middle of a swollen and mottled bruise, on the spot over her heart on her left breast. A cupcake with icing and surrounded by the words: _Carly's Love – Carly's Heart – Carly's Soul_. In permanent ink. Displayed on Sam's body. Painful needles had painted Sam's answer on her skin.

"Sam," Carly whispered softly, affectionately, all anger gone. All doubt erased. She brought her lips down to Sam's.

"Carly," Sam tried to say, sounding lost for words.

"Shut up," Carly grinned. "You've never said so much in all your life..."


	11. 20 Years Later

Sam blinked.

She looked, with a blank expression, at the woman behind the small table. The name tag on her dress told Sam that the woman's name was Stephanie Kilaren. Yet, she looked more like Mrs. Kilaren. There were strands of gray hairs mixed in with the brown and the face had more wrinkles than she remembered, but Sam had to agree that this was her art teacher. Sam was confused since the woman had aged over the summer.

Mrs. Kilaren beamed and handed Sam a name tag. "Not that anyone will need this to remember you, Samantha. How have you been?"

Sam wrinkled her brow. _How had she been?_ She was only gone the summer. Wasn't she...? Mechanically, she accepted the sticky name tag and pressed it to her left breast on her...oh, toast! Why was she wearing a dress? She slowly looked to her feet to find her nylon legs ending in dressy black pumps. Erg...

"Welcome back, Samantha," Mrs. Kilaren said again, waving her toward the gymnasium entrance.

As Sam moved toward the double doors to the school gym, she had a chance to glance around at various student made banners. Most of them read: "Welcome back, Class of 2012!" That slowed her arrival at the open doorway and she looked inside. There was subdued lights from ceiling strobes, tables and chairs set up at one end, what looked like a refreshment table set up left of the door, a large dance floor area near the stage and a bunch of adults mingling around. There was music from around 2008 playing.

"You going to block the door the entire night or go inside?" came a man's voice beside her.

Sam turned to face the voice and saw a familiar face, a bit leaner then she remembered and a significantly large amount of hair missing. She had to glance at the name tag to make sure. "Gibby?"

"Gibson," Gibby corrected. "I go by Gibson, now, Sam." He smiled. "How have you been? I haven't seen you since grad."

"Uhm...," Sam fumbled in her memory which had nothing to give her. She shrugged. Uncharacteristically, for her, she remained silent, kinda stunned. Gibby had not grown much taller, but had thinned out quite a bit. It took a few moments to coordinate her voice with her brain. "How have _you_ been?" She figured to probe him for information, instead.

Gibby gave a slight shrug. "Aw, you know. The years have been good to me. Went to college and then the Army. Left that and became an announcer for RBS Media. Now, I run my own audio webshow." he produced a little black and electric-blue device from his pocket and held it out toward Sam, pressing the screen. Then, he returned it to his pocket. "I sent you my address. Check me out, sometime... Well, I'm going in! Nice seeing you again, Sam!"

Gibby moved past her and entered the gym. She watched him head over to a group of people and start to hob-nob. Her expression felt like a mix of confusion and weirded-out-edness. Wait, is that even a word? She sighed and followed her former victim, one of them, anyway, into the gymnasium. She went over to the refreshment table and poured herself some punch, trying to wrap her mind around what was happening.

"Sam?" came another ghost from the past. "Sam! It _is_ you! Wow! I never thought you would _dare _to show up here."

Sam turned to see a familiar face. Brown hair touched with silver at the temples, glasses, mustache and beard, taller, filled out, same brown eyes, though. He was dressed in a black crewneck, grey dressy pants and shiny black shoes and looking very handsome. Wait! Did she just say that about him? About _him_? Ugh!

"Benson," was all she managed and it came out as a flat statement.

Freddy laughed and shook his head. "Same old Sam. How have you been all these years?"

_Years?_ "Um, ok, I guess... You?"

"Not bad, not bad. My age hasn't caught me yet," he grinned. "Still enjoying life, traveling, chasing the dream." His face lost the pleasant expression and he shuffled as he looked at their feet. "Um...have you spoken to Carly yet?"

Sam furrowed her brow. Wouldn't she have _arrived_ with Carly? "I guess not," she muttered to herself. She looked around for the beautiful brunette. "I don't see her."

Freddy looked around a bit, then found her. He pointed across the room to a tall, thin woman with curly red hair and her back to them. She was talking with four other people and laughing, taking long looks around the gym, except behind her, as if searching for someone. Then, Freddy put his hand to Sam's back and pushed her in the redhead's direction.

Giving him a curious look, Sam found herself walking across the floor toward the redhead. The people the redhead was with saw her coming and must have said something because the redhead reacted, stiffened as if someone had slapped her. The people around her started to drift away, looking everywhere but at them. And, then Sam was beside her as the redhead turned to look at her, with Sam's heels making them the same height.

"Carly!" Sam said, maybe overly brightly, but she was very happy to see her girlfriend, even if she did have her hair colored red somehow since the last time she had seen her. She put her arms out to hug Carly, but Carly brought her hand up quick and stopped her with a hand to Sam's chest. Sam looked confused.

"I _don't_ think so!" Carly even took a step back before she brought her arm down.

Sam's head swam. Carly just rejected her. What the hell? "Carly, what the hell?"

"What the – ? You think you can waltz in here after 20 years and just throw your arms around me like nothing ever happened?" Carly's voice was harsh, but still at the conversational level. But, she was quite peeved. She narrowed her eyes as she saw Sam slowly open her mouth: "And don't say that you didn't _waltz _in here..."

Sam shut her mouth.

What had she done that made Carly so angry at her? It must have been bad. _20 years?_ Yeah, it was bad. "Whatever I did, Carls," she began, probably not the right approach, but words and Sam had a hate-hate relationship. "I am _absolutely _sorry."

"_Whatever you did?_" Carly's thin eyebrows went up, her eyes wide as if Sam had said she was really an orangutan. "Sam. You _know_ what you did." She went quiet for a moment. "You know, you could have told me. I would have understood. You could have at least said goodbye to me." She shook her head. "But, _twenty years_, Sam. And not a word? You could have said _something_...I waited..."

Ever feel like you walked into a conversation at the end and wondered what it was all about? Sam was feeling just like that. She shook her head slowly, trying to imagine what secret she had kept from the love of her life.

"It's ok, Sam," Carly said quietly. "I guess you gave me all I could ever hope to get. I just wish you had trusted me more." She sighed and looked at her former lover. "You know I _had_ to go away to school. _Nobody _turns down a Princeton scholarship." Carly gave a faint, distant smile. "I would have returned for you. But, you never gave me the chance to show you. You just assumed that we would grow apart."

Sam looked down, her eyes very sad. This was a nightmare. It had to be. Why would she ever doubt her Cupcake?

"It took a while to get over you, Sam," Carly continued. "I waited for over a decade for you to contact me. I turned down a lot of offers. _A lot. _The best years of my life wasted on someone that just didn't care about me."

Sam looked up quick, a mix of pain and hurt in her eyes.

"It took therapy and time, but I learned to deal with the rejection, Sam. I moved on and met someone...," her voice trailed away. "He's very nice and treats me and our children very well. He loves us, Sam. He loves _me_. And he makes me happy. It took a while, but my life got back on track." She paused. "I hated you for a long time, Sam. Peter helped me to forgive you and get over you. I hope that you have had a good life. I really do. It's the only way what you did makes sense to me." Carly gave Sam a look filled with pity.

Pity? _Pity!_ Nobody shows Sam Puckett _pity_! That was the worst thing Carly could have done. It was the most hurtful, the most damaging thing. Carly had pierced Sam's soul with her pity.

Sam reacted.

Sam cried.

Sam grabbed the neck of her dress and tore it down, exposing her bra and her left breast. It was still there. Faded over the years, but still clear as daylight. A purple cupcake with icing and the words: _Carly's Love – Carly's Heart – Carly's Soul. _Still there.

Carly gave Sam a sad smile. She reached up to her own neckline and gently pulled at the collar to expose her left breast area, without ripping anything. On her skin, in the place over her heart, for all to see, and people were looking by now, there was...

...nothing.


	12. Sam's Meat

"CARLY!!!"

Sam sat up fast and experienced instant disorientation. Her head pounded, her vision was blurred and everything was dark. She threw her arms around her knees and hugged them to her chin, feeling emotions batter the insides of her chest, her heart beating hard, her breathing ragged and short. She felt dizzy. She felt sick. She felt cold.

She shivered in the dark. She realized that her legs were bare and she felt naked. Looking down at herself, Sam realized that she was still wearing her bikini. It was pink with white polka-hearts. Okay, so it was Carly's bikini, but Sam was currently the occupier. And, as she regained composure, steadied her breathing and had a look around, she found herself on the roof of the Bushwell Towers. And, she discovered that everything was dark because she was wearing sunshades.

She removed the sunshades. Nope. That was only part of it. The sun had gone down, sucking the light with it, on the western horizon. Without the big ball of sky fire, the air had grown colder. Sam shivered again and felt like a meatless cheeseburger...all wrong.

Mmmm...cheeseburger... Sam decided she was hungry.

As she made her way back down to Carly's apartment, she tried to remember the dream. Yeah, just a dream. She wasn't the brightest light on the Christmas tree, but she had her moments. Although, it felt more like a nightmare. Imagine. Life without Carly. As if Sam would ever abandon the love of her life. As if Carly would ever leave her.

Sam paused at the door to the Shay household and glanced down at the tattoo emblazoned on her left breast. It was still there. Bright and new. The bruising had faded away and the soreness was gone. She caressed her cupcake and smiled warm thoughts.

They had gone to the beach two days after Sam had gotten the tattoo. She had worn a more modest one piece bathing suit under skater shorts. There was no way she was gonna have Fredweiner ogling her perfect body. That was exclusively the right of Carly. But she made sure that the swimsuit was low enough in the front to expose her tattoo for public display. Carly had said that she didn't have to show it to people, but Sam was proud of it. If there was any doubt left, Sam was kicking its butt and chasing it away.

Sure, they had gotten some odd looks from people who recognized them either from school or iCarly. People who knew instantly that the Carly on the tattoo was the Carly on Sam's arm. There were a couple of incidents when some girls made trouble for themselves by making moves of Carly while Sam was occupied with eating. Not that Sam was jealous. Nope. Never. Carly was _her_ cupcake. But, Carly had gotten upset when they made an issue of Sam having been marked as Carly's, yet Carly bore no markings of ownership. They concluded that Carly must be keeping herself available for something better.

Sam had seen the hurt in Carly's face. She knew the brunette beauty would have loved nothing better than to get her own tattoo. Spencer would not have loved it quite as much. He was already a bit iffy with their closer than close relationship. That might have tipped him toward becoming more parental and slapping them with even more rules. Ugh. Rules. Why do adults have so many rules?

They had left the beach and went home. Carly wasn't much in the mood to swim or hang out. She was taking it way too much to heart that her heart was unmarked. No matter how much Sam had tried to convince her cupcake that she had no need to mark her body in order for Sam to know Carly's heart belong to no one but Sam, Carly still dwelled on what had been said. All the way to the car, on the trip home, and for the week after, Carly was preoccupied with a belief that she needed to do something to demonstrate that she belonged to Sam. As if she had to prove something to those future fishwives.

Sam grinned when she recalled excusing herself when they had reached the car to go pee before the trip home. She never told Carly that she had gone back and kicked their butts. All five of them. The look of pride on Carly's face when she got back to the car, though, told Sam that she would never have to tell Carly anything. Her cupcake just knew. Carly was the bright star on the top of the Christmas tree.

Nobody messed with Sam's cupcake.

She opened the door and entered the apartment. It was empty down here. Sam recalled Carly having an errand to run and left Sam to go back to snoozing in what passed for sunlight in Seattle. Whatever it was must have taken quite a while since she never came back to wake her up.

Sam decided to go up to the bedroom and get changed into something less revealing before the nub caught sight of her and stroked out.

The bedroom was empty and Sam was beginning to have this need to see Carly. That nightmare really threw her for more of a loop than she realized. She felt an emptiness, like a part of her had been hacked away.

The bathroom door opened and Carly wandered out, looking like blazing sun when it suddenly appears from behind a gray cloud. Sam's face immediately reflected the light with a big grin. "Hey, Cupcake! Hungry?" _Hungry?_

Carly stopped with a shocked look on her face. She relaxed once her brain recognized her Sam was standing in her bedroom in the cutest two piece pink bikini and smiled back at her. "Oh! Hi, Sam. I was just going up to wake you. I only got back a few minutes ago. Had to...um...change first," she trailed off.

Sam curled her eyebrows, but decided to ignore it. She met Carly halfway across the floor and seized her in the tightest hug she could manage without breaking the brunette in half or crushing any necessary organs. "Never leave you. _Ever_," Sam whispered in complete sincerity.

"Um...o-kayyy," Carly chuckled as she returned the hug magnitudes less forceful. "Where did _that_ come from?" She felt Sam pattern her neck with kisses, warm lips pressing against her pulse points. A moan escaped her mouth. "Ahhh...tell me later..."

They had almost made it from the middle of the bedroom floor to the bed. Sam, being a rather impatient girl, could restrain herself for only a handful of steps. Well, three and a half, to be exact. Then, she had decided to make base camp here on the carpet and try for the bed in the morning, pulling a willing Carly to the floor and proceeding to cover her body in tiny bites and kisses, frustrated by the shield of clothing protecting Carly's body.

"Do you mind?" Sam shouted at Carly's long pants, as she struggled with the zipper and began working them off of Carly's long slender legs.

Carly laughed playfully, "I thought you were hungry?"

Sam glanced up at Carly's flushed face, grinning and waggling her eyebrows. "I am..."

"Ohh..." Carly's eyes went wide and her expression turned to one of nervous anticipation when she realized just what the blond demon goddess was intending to perform. "Sam..." her voice barely a whisper, but so full of need.

The pants put up a good fight, but in the end, Sam's determination won the day and they went flying somewhere across the floor. There was only one barrier between her and her prize. It was flimsy, and pink and lacy. How can anything that looked like that stand up to the tigress? She narrowed her eyes at the obstruction, as if her very gaze, the Puckett Stare, would intimidate those intimates right off Carly's body, never to return. Sam moved in for the kill.

Sam was on her knees between Carly's parted legs, focusing her attention on the fragile panties covering the womanhood of the beauty laying beneath her on the floor. Her fingers dug into the waist of the panties and prepared to remove them with great speed. But, the flash of something caught the ever watchful paranoid at the back of her mind. The one that unconsciously saw everything going on around her and picked the _worst_ times to make an observation.

She abandoned the panties and crawled forward so that she was now leaning above and over Carly, propped on her outstretched arms and staring at her face to face, a suspicious look painting Sam's features as she eyed her girlfriend. Sam may not be the brightest light, but she was as sharp as the point of a kabob when it came to seeing something out of place. Like a certain brunette who was favoring her left shoulder.

"Explain," Sam said slowly, coolly, evenly.

Carly just lightly shook her head, as if she had no idea what was being asked, and tried to give Sam a weak smile, but it came off with more guilt than anything else. After a half moment under Sam's intense scrutiny, Carly caved. She was no good at this secret thing, anyway. She opened her mouth to speak, but nothing came to mind to say.

Carly reached up to her collar and gave a firm tug to expose her left breast and the bandage that was there. She saw Sam's eyes slowly scan down to the gauze and then back up to Carly's eyes. When their eyes locked again, she searched Sam for the disapproval she had hoped would not be there. What she saw confused her.

Sam looked back down at the gauze. She gently lifted it at the corner with her right fingers and pulled it carefully away to look at what was underneath. It was beginning to bruise and would look ugly and sore tomorrow. Sam just stared at it. The emptiness ebbed. A warmth seemed to take its place.

Carly had been doodling ever since that day at the beach. Probably before then. She never showed it to Sam, telling her that she would show it when it was perfect and the time was right. As Sam looked at it, she realized just how perfect it was. Sam simple. Sam basic.

A cooked ham. Below it: "Sam's Meat".

Her eyes found Carly's again. She slowly shook her head and grinned. She put the bandage back into place. She gave her a tender kiss on Carly's lips. She edged her way back down Carly's body to get back to what she had been doing before the interruption. Those panties have been given enough of a respite. Time to evict them.

After all, that ham reminded Sam that she was still hungry. And withing moments, the only thing that was heard in Carly's bedroom was a single cry...

"SAM!"


	13. Smoothie Talkers

"You're smart, you're pretty, you could _so_ get into Princeton!"

Carly shook her head and laughed demurely. She was a bit embarrassed by the intensity of Sam. This conversation had come out of nowhere. What had started as an afternoon hanging out at the Groovie Smoothie and talking about ideas for the next iCarly had somehow turned into what they were going to do after high school and where they would be in twenty years. Carly felt even more disconcerted since this current topic was brought up by a suddenly contemplative blonde.

"Sam, don't be silly," Carly rolled her eyes. "I'm not going to Princeton University. Besides, what can I learn there that I can't get on this coast?"

Sam watched Carly as she slurped on her smoothie, as if preparing an argument. She took a moment for a breath, then spoke: "An amazing education at an amazing school so you can do amazing things. Just, promise me you'll never dye your hair red."

Scrunching her face, Carly eyed the blond. "Why not? I think I'd look good with red hair..."

"You'd look good bald and covered in thick body hair," Sam responded with absolute certainty and a touch of sarcasm. It was true, though. To Sam, Carly was an image of perfection and grace. There really was never a time that Sam had ever thought that the brunette was not hot. Even that night that she had spent holding Carly's hair while she power-puked some bad chicken into the porcelain, Sam found her totally doable...er, stunning. Yeah. _Stunning._

Carly smiled. The blond was looking at her as if she was a piece of ham roasting on a BBQ spit. Hey, this was Sam. That required a whole different set of metaphors. "Sam, ew! Never tell me about your hairy-bald fantasies again."

"¡Hola, hermosa señora y el demonio!" Freddy grinned, grabbing a seat between Carly and Sam with a large smoothie in his hand. "What's up?"

Carly smiled: "Hey, Freddy."

Sam glowered: "Freddork." She caught the reference.

"Sam was being contemplative," Carly started.

"Hey!" Sam warned. "No big words."

Carly and Freddy both rolled their eyes at the brooding blonde. "I meant, you were thinking about our futures." She looked at Freddy: "We were discussing what we were going to do after high school."

Freddy chuckled and gave Sam a wry grin: "One word, Sam: paper or plastic?"

"That's _two_ words, dweeb," Sam shot back.

"Ok, then, how about...," Freddy made a patronizing face and waggled his head, "..._would you like fries with that?_"

Sam raised a fist above the table, pointed in the direction of her source of annoyance. "How about a five-knuckle sandwich," she gave back, with a side of attitude.

"Can you up-size that?" Freddy laughed, taking a swig from his smoothie.

Carly put a hand on Sam's fist, guiding it back to the table, laughing at her two best friends. "The two of you should seriously consider getting a room..."

Sam shot a look at her girlfriend with a twinkle of humor. "Yeah, but where would I hide the body?"

"You should be so lucky, Puckett," Freddy chuckled. "So, what did you guys come up with? Obviously, Carly goes to a top university..."

"Like Princeton," Sam interjected, raising an eyebrow at Carly.

Freddy nodded: "Absolutely, Princeton. I could see that. I'm thinking Harvard. That would be great!"

Carly frowned at Freddy's exuberance. Sure, great for them, but what about Sam? Freddy and she would be among the brains of higher learning while Sam would be stuck back in Seattle doing God only knows what trouble the blond firebrand would get into without Carly around to temper her. No, she would never allow that to happen. Even if it meant passing on Princeton for state university.

"Freddy," Carly said low, a bit reproachful.

Freddy looked confused. "What's wrong with that? We'd all be together, th-- OW!" He gave Sam an angry glare and reached down to rub his right shin, the one the demon just kicked with _way_ too much force. He'd be limping for the rest of the day. "What –?"

"Shh," Sam shushed, so quick that Carly had missed it, since she was so focused on Freddy's discomfort for a moment before giving Sam a withering look.

"Sam!" Carly admonished. "Behave." Then, to Freddy: "I want to stay with Sam. I'm going to register at U-Dub. Besides, I'd need a scholarship to afford Princeton. That's if I even met the admission requirements."

Freddy frowned at Carly, then swung a look at Sam who just glared at him in such a way that seemed to say that if he spoke, she would rip out his voice box. After a momentary stare-down, which Freddy always lost, by the way, since not even a corpse could out stare Sam, he just sadly shook his head.

"Count me in, then..." Freddy conceded. "I guess. U-Dub all around..."

Carly studied Freddy for a long time. "You'd give up Harvard for Sam and me?"

Freddy gave a wry smile. "Sure, why not." Then, he gave Sam a curious look. She gave the same cautious look of warning. He shook his head and focused on his smoothie.

"I need another smoothie, guys," Carly announced. "I'll be right back."

Sam and Freddy watched Carly get up and walk out of earshot. Then, Sam turned on Freddy, giving him a solid whack in the arm.

"Ow!" Freddy hissed. "Sam, what the hell?"

"Way to almost spill it, dork," Sam growled.

"I thought you told her by now," Freddy explained, rubbing his right arm. Great, now a limp _and_ a gimpy arm. "Remember? No more secrets?"

"You were never supposed to find out," Sam mumbled. "How _did_ you find out?"

Freddy looked confused. "Um...you...told...me," he answered slowly, carefully, uncertainly.

"No...I...didn't," Sam growled back.

Freddy rolled his eyes and used his fingers for quote marks, "Oh, yeah..._'Melanie'_ told me..." He shook his head. "Sam, I'm beginning to think you have a split personality. You even showed me the letter..."

"Shut it, Fredifer," Sam snarled, looking up as Carly retook her seat and eyed the both of them.

"I can't leave the two of you alone for a minute, can I," Carly laughed, shaking her head. "What was it _this_ time?"

"Sam?" Freddy asked, innocently, staring at the blond.

Sam saw Carly was also looking expectantly at her. "Freddy's got a thing for my sister," she answered, coolly.

Freddy groaned and banged his head on the table.


	14. Carly Knows

"Told ya not to wear the heels."

Their day had been shopping at the Pacific Place mall. The entire day. Up and down the escalators, through every store at least twice, mall food and mall rats. A regular girls day out. They had spent as much as they spent and were totally spent. Flaked out on the sofa.

Sam was plopped on the left side of the sofa, her feet crossed on the coffee table. On her lap was Carly's bare feet and she was slowly rubbing and massaging her girlfriend's aching arches. Carly was stretched out on the right side with her head propped up on one arm behind her head. Her right hand rested on her tummy. They both looked worn.

The living room was quiet. They had left the television off. Only the light of a fading day through the windows illuminated the room from behind them.

Carly sighed in relief and satisfaction at the attention her sore feet were receiving from Sam. Her eyes were closed and a small pout painted her face. "They looked so good with my outfit," she sulked and flexed her toes in Sam's amazing hands. "That feels soooo good, Sammy..."

"You're in good hands here, Cupcake," Sam smiled, working her thumbs into the tiny arches of Carly's small feet, eliciting another sigh of pleasure from the brunette. This wasn't the first time and likely would not be the last time that she had Carly's alabaster feet in her hands. Sam had become very knowledgeable in the ways of podiatric therapy. It was all in the finger strength, she had discovered. And, Carly seemed only too willing to let Sam use her feet to perfect her skills.

Sam raised an eyebrow, staring at Carly's beautiful feet. She had perfectly manicured toenails, thanks to an hour at Slevin Salon for pedicures and Carly's almost daily attention and obsession with body maintenance. They were painted a tasteful shade of blood red, a shade that Sam had picked out for her. A Sam-Approved color.

Sam stole a glance at Carly. She had her arm bent behind her head so that her face was angled toward Sam. Her eyes were lightly closed with a content smile on her face. Sam studied the curve of Carly's lips with that happy almost-smirk, the blood red of her lipstick matching the toes. She wondered how the brunette had suckered her into pampering her feet.

Her cupcake could convince her to do anything. Sam gave her complete trust. As tough and edgy as Sam was, if they were in one of those domination relationships, Sam knew that it was Carly who would be on top. Sam was Tanto to her Lone Ranger. Louise to her Thelma. No, wait. Didn't they kill themselves? Gabrielle to her Xena. Hrmm, actually Sam was more Xena than Carly. And Carly really wasn't much of a fighter, but she sure was smart. Yeah, Carly was more Gabrielle. She liked Xena. Especially the hot tub scene. Yes. Awesome scene. Hot.

Carly slowly opened her eyes to find Sam staring at her, eyebrows raised but obviously lost in her own thoughts about something. She had known that something was up when Sam's fingers had slackened and slowed. A smile widened on her lips as she watched Sam's conflict going on inside of her head expressed through her eyes. She could be a complex girl, at times. Carly knew there was something very important going on in the blonde's head.

Probably sex, she decided.

Sam gradually realized that Carly was watching her and gave her girlfriend a grin as she focused her hands back on Carly's arches. But, they continued staring at each other, eyes locked in silent communication. Such was their bond.

Carly rolled her eyes at Sam: "You're thinking about sex again."

"No, I wasn't," Sam answered with mock offense. Then, a slow grin crept onto her face again. "Yeah, okay. Maybe..."

"Horn Dog."

Sam opened her mouth to answer, but what she said was not what she was thinking. Actually, it was probably more like what she was thinking, but not what she meant to say. "I want you to apply to Princeton."

Carly blinked and frowned. This conversation wasn't going in the direction she was expecting. "Wh-at? Where did _that_ come from?"

"Um..._me_, I think," Sam answered, looking stunned. She shook her head in thought. "But, yeah, you totally should."

"Sam, we talked about this," Carly explained, confused at why this was coming up now. "I'm going to U-Dub. I want to stay with you."

"What are ya saying, Shay?" Sam grumbled. "I'm not university material? Or maybe I'm too rough for all those east coast snobs you'll be hanging with?"

Carly creased her forehead. "No! I never said that. Exactly." She sighed. "Well, ok, Sam. You're not someone I saw going to university. I mean, you barely want to go to high school, for heck's sake!"

Chuckling, Sam gave a wry grin: "_Heck's sake?_ My my, Carly. Quite the potty mouth you got going on there..."

"Look," Carly tried again. "Where is this coming from?"

"Carls, you're a smart girl. You have so much more potential. Don't waste it on U-Dub," Sam said seriously. Her look was one that said not to debate with her.

Carly looked up at the ceiling for a bit, thinking to herself, before she looked back at Sam and spoke: "Sam..."

A curled eyebrow responded from the blond.

"...I _know_. Okay?" Carly said in a low voice, almost as if she didn't want to say it out loud. "I know about the letter..."

Sam gave Carly a hard look and muttered something under her breath.

"Freddy didn't tell me, Sam, and you are not going to tattoo _'shut up'_ on his tongue," she chastised. "I talk to Melanie, too, you know." Carly regarded her friend quietly. "You know, you could have just told me, Sammy. It's okay to share things that bug you. I'm always here for you."

Sam smiled at Carly. She saw love in her eyes when she looked at those big brown eyes. "Carly, it's okay. Really. I'm very happy for Melanie. She _needs_ to go to school. That's really more her thing than mine." She laughed at herself. "And, you're right, I'm not into the whole higher-learning thing. Education just bugs me."

Carly took back her feet and swung her body around so that her head ended up in Sam's lap and she was looking up at the blond goddess. She reached a hand up and caressed Sam's cheeks.

"I want you to go to Princeton," Sam was insisting. "I'll even follow you out there, if that's what you want. I'm sure I can find _something_ to occupy myself with while you're brain is being stretched."

Chuckling. "Yeah, that's kinda what scares me..." Carly's face fell somewhat. "Pointless to debate this, anyway, Sam. It's not like I could ever afford to go to Princeton. U-Dub, sure. I can live here and save money." She sighed. "Unless Princeton decided to give me a scholarship, too."

"Yeah," Sam nodded, enjoying her cupcake's hand on her skin, nestling her cheek into her hand. "Melanie always seems to get lucky. I hate her."

"No, you don't," Carly giggled. Sam's pretend despising of her twin sister was one of her charms. "You love her."

"Yeah, whatev."


	15. My Father's Daughter

Ugh.

Sam had not been home is several days. Not really since the end of the school year. She had been spending all her time staying with Carly almost full time now and was truly considering the Shay apartment at Bushwell Towers her home instead of this rented semi-detached thing in a low scale Seattle neighborhood. Why her mother had never moved in all these years was beyond her.

What did _semi-detached_ mean anyway?

She had been staring at the backdoor for several minutes since she had climbed the back fence into her yard and stood amid the unmown tall grass and weed and various abandoned debris littering the years of neglect. The yard had become a jungle with weeds having overpowered the weaker vegetation long ago.

Sam liked the yard just as it was. It reminded her of her life. Disorganized and wild and littered with the detritus of neglect. She was a weed. Tough and resilient. A survivor. Overpowering the weak. Claiming the world as her own. The more she had to think about it, the more she had come to realize that she was a reflection of her father.

And she missed him...

From time to time...

Like today.

With a heavy sigh, Sam reached for the door handle to the back door, turned it and went inside the house. The back door opened into the porch and the top of the basement steps. Sam mounted the three short steps up into the kitchen and saw the pile of dirty pots and dishes filling both sinks, the discarded take away food packages, an empty bottle of vodka, two large Peppy Cola bottles drained of their bubbly goodness, an open bottle of Tylenol and an old gray cat licking the contents of a tuna can. She scratched the cat behind the ear and gave it a smile as she continued on to the refrigerator, pulling on the door.

Old mother hubbard, she rhymed to herself and twisted her lips in a sideways frown. A carton of milk, random condiments, a plate of some night's supper, wilted vegetation and a bowl of chicken wings in honey garlic sauce. She checked it with her fingers...yup, honey garlic. Sam knew her sauces by look, smell, taste and touch. Leaving the food for her mom, she made a mental note to take more money out of the account before she returned to Carly's and restock the pantry.

Heh..._pantry_...sounds like _panty_...Sam grinned.

She closed the door and headed for her bedroom, stopping in the hallway as she heard voices coming from the front room. Her mother's belonged to one. Sam really couldn't believe that the other voice was even in her home again. But, he was hear and talking to her mom. She wandered casually around the corner and through the archway that led from the front door to the living room and stairs up to the second floor. She stood there eying both her mother and Principal Franklin.

"Hello, Sam," greeted his calm and even voice that had always had a hint of restrained humor, as if he just wanted to belt out a gut-laugh. She had become very familiar with his voice over the years. "Could you sit down a moment, please?"

"Hi, Ted," Sam greeted with a small smile and flick of her wrist as she plopped down on the couch next to her mom. The sofa was well worn, but comfortable. A old wood coffee table separated them from Ted in the arm chair opposite them. "Let's get the formalities out of the way first. Ahem," Sam coughed into her curled hand, "It wasn't me. I didn't do it. I was nowhere near whatever it was that happened and I don't know how that happened to Gibby..."

There was a twinkle of humor in Ted Franklin's eyes. As much as Sam tried to convince people otherwise, she both admired and respected her principal. He had tolerated her extravagant behavior all of these years at Ridgeway. He had personally protected her from the more severe consequences of her anger-fed actions, for reasons that she still could not understand. He had been as much of a father figure to her as he had been her principal. And he backed down to nobody. Gotta respect a principal with principles.

Sam grinned inwardly. She was a poet and damn well knew it.

Chuckling, he said: "I'm not here to punish you, Sam. I came to speak with your mother. But, since your here, I think you should stay a moment. This concerns you, anyway."

"Okay. Sounds ominous," Sam said in her usual detached tone. "What up?"

Sam noticed that her mom had been cautiously eying her from the other side of the couch, as if studying Sam with a appraising eye. It made her a bit nervous to suddenly be receiving all of ths attention. Nothing, she knew, ever came from so much interest in her life.

"I understand that Melanie received a scholarship to Princeton University," Ted began.

"Yeah, we're all teared up over it," Sam deadpanned.

"_You_ should be," Ted commented back with an arched eyebrow for emphasis.

Sam furrowed her eyes as she had no idea where this was leading. "You got a point to make here, Ted?"

Ted indicated the various papers spread out on the coffee table amid the regular clutter. They were old. Like _years_ old. Melanie's name was on them. As Sam leaned over to look closer, a tight knot formed in her gut. These were the entrance exams for Melanie's private school scholarship program. Almost a decade old now.

Why was her past returning to taunt her? What was this all about? Oh fudge on a stick! Did they find out? What about Mel? "Recycling day already," Sam quipped, trying to keep an edge of nervousness out of her voice, but obviously no longer feeling as jovial as she had been a moment ago.

Ted gave her a questioning look. "Sam, why didn't you take the SATs?"

So this was what this was all about. Sam shrugged: "Don't need a test to tell me what I already know."

"Sam," Ted continued, in his calm, almost therapeutic voice, "the SAT exams are not about telling you what you know, but are about determining your academic placement with universities and qualifying you for various scholarships and bursaries."

"These are important tests, Samantha," her mom cut it. "They determine your future."

"No, mom," Sam sighed, giving her the look... "_I_ determine my future. And college isn't in it. We aren't exactly rolling in wealth to afford me to go to school, anyway."

"There are bursaries and -" Ted began, but was cut off by Sam.

"That other people need," Sam interjected. "So, why should I give them competition? One less person going after a scholarship gives...another person a better chance at one..."

"Carly, you mean," her mom stated with a sad and yet proud look. The way she watched Sam, as if seeing her for the first time, was really wack.

"Sam," ted spoke again. "Look at these papers again."

She did. "Yeah, so...?" Nervous. Did he know?

"These are Melanie's exams for her scholarship," Ted explained unnecessarily. "But...they are in _your_ handwriting. Trust me, Sam...I _know_ you handwriting by now. _You_ took the exam in your sister's place. _You_ got her the scholarship. Why?"

Sam was dumbfounded. Her secret was out. The secret that she hid from everyone so that Melanie could keep going to her private school. So that Melanie was someplace nice and safe and away from the hell of their poor lives. Someplace where Mel could prosper and grow and make something of her life. It's what _he_ would have done. Sam looked from Ted to her mom and back, unable to hide the look of panic on her face. She slowly shook her head, trying to work the angles.

"Wrong," she croaked. "No. This is Mel's writing. We're twins, so of course it seems like -"

Her mom reached out and put an uncharacteristic hand on Sam's arm, causing Sam to freeze in shock. Her mom had never been the touchy feely type. She tensed and began to look a bit frantic, like a cornered animal.

Ted leaned forward with concern. "Sam, calm down. Nobody is here to take anything away from your sister. But, I want you to have fair dues, too."

"Why," Sam eyed him suspiciously. "What good will that do? I'm happy as everything is. Mel goes to Princeton. Carly goes to Princeton. They all get educated and have great lives."

"And what about you, Sam?" Ted asked, quietly.

Sam shrugged. "I'll survive."

Ted watched Sam for a few moments. "Did Carly tell you that she turned down the Princeton Scholarship Program?"

"She said she decided to go to U-Dub. Wait, what do you mean _turned down_? She told me she never applied." Sam was confused.

"Carly came to my office before the end of term and told me that she only wanted to apply for local scholarships. They offered her the Princeton Scholarship based on her grades and SAT scores," Ted explained. "She turned them down. It was more important to her to stay in Washington. And now I understand the reason."

"Why, Sam? Why did you do it?" her mom asked from beside her, still touching her arm.

Sam gave her a sad and tired look as the years of hiding her secret, all the walls she had built, as the reputation she had fostered, all of it was crumbling to an end. How did she explain that she was protecting her sister from a life like hers? From poverty and a future at Chili-My-Bowl? From _paper or plastic_? How did she make them understand that she had to look after Carly, too. And her mom.

"Why?" Sam whispered, seeing her mom's look of pride for her _bad_ daughter. For the daughter that worked the angles, could scheme her way out of any situation, that just did what had to be done. Sam shrugged: "I'm my father's daughter, mom."


	16. A Truth Is Told

"Be nice to Sam."

Freddy lifted his head and gave Carly a questioning look from where he was working at the laptop cart of the iCarly studio. _Be nice to Sam?_ As if _he_ was the one causing all the trouble. "Why not _be nice to Freddy?_" he suggested.

Carly rolled her eyes.

"I'm always -" he caught the accusations in Carly's glare "-_ usually _-" he amended "- nice to Sam..." and under his breath, he added: "...that foul demon spawn of Satan's hellfire..."

"I can still hear you," Carly chuckled from her beanbag seat across the room. She was looking at him over her shoulder as she was facing the swing out monitor. A music video was playing silently on the monitor. "I'm being serious, Freddy. Something's bugging Sam -"

"Something's _always_ bugging Sam," Freddy interjected. Silence and a steady stare from Carly made him look back at his laptop and mutter: "Loud part soft..."

Carly shook her head lightly in amusement. The dynamic between Freddy and Sam had been going on for years and it was oddly a pillar of stability in their lives. It was something one could rely upon, like water over Niagara Falls. Even though, Carly knew, they each had a grudging respect for one another. Anyone who messed with Freddy, other than Sam, had to deal with Sam, and the same in reverse. Not that Freddy was that intimidating, but he could sure be crafty in other ways.

"So," Freddy tried again. "Why am I being nice to Sam?"

"She's brooding over this whole higher learning thing," Carly admitted. "We're going, she's not and I think she's feeling left out. Like our friendship's gonna end or something."

Freddy frowned in thought. "She still didn't tell -" he suddenly popped open his eyes in fright and waved his hands in the air before him, erasing everything he almost spilt out. "Never mind! I wasn't going to say anything. Not. A. Thing. Um...in fact, I don't even know how to speak! Ugh wugga pah ergle... see?"

Carly was laughing at his weirdness. "Freddy, it's okay. I talk to Melanie, too. She told me all about Princeton and the fact that Sam's a bit bummed out because I'm not going. I think Sam's just feeling lucky if she passes high school. She never gives herself much credit in that area..."

"Oh, just give it _up,_ Carly," an exasperated Freddy groaned. He put his fingers up for air quotes: " 'Melanie' _is_ Sam! I don't know how she did it, but she either managed to get a Princeton Scholarship or faked it. I doubt it was by academic achievement..." He saw Carly giving him the you're-an-idiot stare. "You know, Carly, I'm not that gullible..."

"Clown Day?" Carly stated.

"Ok..._anymore_, then. I'm not as gullible as I used to be..."

"Freddy, there really is -" Carly was cut off by the elevator's arrival and the door opening to deposit a familiar and well kept blond towing one of those rolling carry-on bags. Both Freddy and Carly stopped too look at the new arrival. Freddy looked like he was about to present an Oscar and nodded his head in admiration for the lengths that Sam would go to in order to keep up this farce. Carly just shook her head at him and said to the girl: "Hi, Mel."

"Hi, Carly," Melanie beamed, as she walked over to Carly's beanbag, turning to wave at Freddy. "Hi, Freddy!"

Freddy just looked at her and shook his head. "Why, hello, _Sam_...," he answered.

Melanie sadly shook his head and sat down beside Carly and they turned their backs to Freddy. "Is he _still_ believing that I'm Sam?"

"Pretty much," Carly admitted.

"Oh, _brother_," Freddy groaned and went back to his laptop.

Melanie gave him a long, sad look, then turned around again, taking Carly into her focus. "I came as soon as I got your message. Where's Sam?"

"Right _here_," Freddy muttered loud enough to be heard. He felt that warning nervousness that had become instinctive to him whenever he felt Sam's threatening presence. It was usually felt at the moment that he did something to make the demonic hell spawn turn her attention onto his existence with dark thoughts of doing him harm. Usually, though, the warning came just a moment before too late. He looked up sharply at Sam-Melanie, but she was ignoring him completely. He narrowed his eyes, suspecting that she was still harboring dark thoughts of his pain. He still felt it. Like telepathy. Freddy gave a shiver to settle his nerves and went back to his laptop. But, he kept an eye on the blond hell-angel.

"At home," Carly answered, ignoring Freddy's comment. "I think. She's been mopey for days. And I don't know how to help. She just won't talk to me about it."

Melanie slowly nodded. "It's about my scholarship," she explained.

Carly frowned. "I don't understand. She seemed okay with that. You deserved it, Mel. And I know that, deep down, Sam is very proud of you. Maybe if she had been the smart one, it would have been her in your place. But, then, _I_ wouldn't have my Sammy. It's very selfish of me, but I glad that Sam wasn't able to get a scholarship to a distant private school. I just don't want to think about my life without her -" Carly noticed that Melanie was looking sad and tormented, almost lost in thought. "What?"

Melanie gave her a sad smile. "Sam never told you then." She said it as a rhetorical statement.

Cautiously, slowly, Carly probed: "Told me what...?"

Melanie shook her head. "You'll need to hear it from Sam..."

"Yeah," Carly scoffed, rolling her eyes. "That's not difficult or anything."

"Okay," Melanie chuckled, getting the point. Her twin sister could be very stubborn when it came to getting her to talk about things bothering her. "She should have told you this herself, anyway. After all, you _are_ one of the reasons it happened. I mean, Sam did this for you as much as for me."

"Me?" Carly wondered, surprised. "Did what?"

"Look," Melanie continued. "I only found out three years ago and Sam swore me to absolute secrecy. But, you deserve to know. Um, you remember the exam for the scholarship program for my school?"

"Yeah, kinda. I was pretty new when we met and you were taking that test," Carly recalled. "I remember Sam being excited about getting her room all to herself. Which is odd, especially now, since she spent most of her time at my place after you left."

Melanie smiled at that. Sam would never admit that she was lonely in her big old room without her twin sister. She was glad that Sam found comfort with Carly. It must have been great to have grown close to someone that just accepted you, bumps and all. Sam wasn't the easiest person to get along with and lacked certain social boundaries the rest of the world took as written. But, Carly had seen through all that and loved her sister for who she was truly.

"That's Sam in a nutshell...," Melanie said. "Anyway, about that exam..." Melanie trailed off as she suddenly imagined the intensity of her sister's furious stare boring holes into her.

"...yes..." Carly drew out.

Melanie seemed torn, but quickly found her resolve and made a decision. She blurted: "Sam took the test in my place, pretending to be me so that I would get the scholarship and get to go to a private school. I _really_ wanted to go since I had first heard about the program." She took a breath. "I was so nervous. Too nervous to take it. But, Sam stepped in and did the test for me. I think she may have intimidated my competition, too. They said that my entry was the only one they had received." She paused. "Sam had given me a test to do at home, telling me that this was the exam. I never knew what she did for me until a couple of years ago when I saw the exam I was supposed to have done and recognized her handwriting."

Carly looked oddly at Melanie, confused.

"Why?" Melanie ventured a guess at the brunette's silence. "_You_, of course. She didn't want to leave you. For the first time, Sam had found a friend that related to her. Someone that liked her despite all of her flaws. And, maybe, because you needed her more than I did. You were the new fish at Ridgeway. Sam figured she needed to look after you so you wouldn't become someone's victim. I think there was a lot more to it than that, though."

"...look after _me?_" Carly was almost speechless. She had to think about that one. It made perfect sense to her once it was verbalized. The fact that Sam had given up a chance at private school was not a surprise, now that Carly knew her inside and out. If she had gone to that school, it would have burnt to the ground in a week. But, all of these years together in Ridgeway, she had been keeping Sam out of serious trouble and at the same time, her blond bombshell was keeping serious trouble away from her. As she looked back on her time at Ridgeway, she had no memory of truly bad times. _Interesting_ times. But, always in Sam's safe hands. "Wow," was all she could think of to say.

"What. A. Story!" Freddy exclaimed, slowly applauding the performance. "That was fantastic! Which one of you came up with this prank?" Carly and Melanie sat with their backs to him and exchanged looks. At least they were not trying to convince him that Melanie was _not_ Sam. "Pfft! As if I'd believe Sam was smart enough to fake her way through a scholarship – OW!" Freddy's cry was quickly followed by a primal scream of horror: "AHH!!!"

Carly and Melanie stood up fast and spun to face Freddy, finding him down on the floor with his right hand grabbing his left shoulder and his left hand firmly grabbing his chest and breathing hard and fast while he exchanged quick looks of shock between Melanie and the blond twin who was standing directly over him, looking down at the dork impassively.

After watching Freddy for a bit, probably to make certain that he didn't stroke out, Sam disregarded the fallen boy and turned toward her sister and her lover. "Nub," she muttered to Freddy as she walked

over to the girls. She gave her sister a curt nod of acknowledgment. "Sis." She'll deal with her in a moment. She had a warm smile of affection for Carly. "Cupcake."

Carly launched herself for the blond, throwing her arms around her in an impressively tight bear hug, planting a big kiss on Sam's soft and ready lips. When Carly finally allowed them some air, her eyes were twinkling but with an edge when she said: "Now, you and me, Sam, we need to have a long talk about secrets."

"Yeah, I kinda figured," Sam quietly responded, looking down a bit like a naughty child caught with her hand in the cookie jar. She smiled devilishly and looked up into Carly's eyes. _Hand in the cookie jar...Carly's cookie...jar._

Carly gave Sam a cautious eye when she saw _that_ look.

Melanie gasped: "Oh, sweet pie! How long were you standing there?"

Sam gave her sister a deadly look. "Long enough, Mel." But, Sam's look suddenly softened, as if she was glad it was all coming out in the open. It too so much more to keep a secret than to share it. "Just promise me one thing, Mel?"

"Sure, sis. Anything."

"Don't ever work for the CIA." Sam was grinning, holding tightly to Carly.

A quiet voice came from behind them, muttering almost incoherently. "There...are...two...Sams..." Freddy was saying. "The Gods must be crazy..."


	17. Waiting

**Author's Note: Hey! I really appreciate all the comments from my fans! I try to give you a quality piece of work. I hope that you enjoy all of my writing. I'm not in the league of a lot of writers on this site, but I'll do my best to entertain you. I took a bit of a break with this story for three reasons: 1) That nasty thing called LIFE getting in the way (which takes a lot of my time), 2) I'm working on a webshow to pitch to Jennette McCurdy's people (which is taking a lot of time to create and write), and 3) This chapter just wasn't flowing right after several false starts. I hope that this end result came out ok. Let me know what you think...we writers are a nervous, self-depreciating animal...our egos need constant feeding... :)**

"Well, _this_ is fun."

Sam's sarcasm does not go down well among the four friends in the small, windowless holding room. Even if she did say it with an amused grin and Carly accepted that this was old school for the blond, Freddy and Melanie were not in the same frame of mind. Their mood was, actually, quite the opposite and not even Carly was really looking forward to the outcome.

"Shut up, Puckett," Freddy snarled, holding an ice pack to his left eye, his good eye glaring at Sam sitting on the other side of the room. He was holding another ice pack between his legs. He was resting his head back against the clinical green wall and his once nice blue windbreaker was ripped at the sleeve and torn at the zipper and stained with the blue dye of a slushie that had been dumped over his head. Next to him sat Melanie who was slowly rubbing his left thigh soothingly with one hand and running her fingers through his still sticky hair with the other, giving him her full attention as he nursed his wounded eye.

"Freddy," Carly sighed, trying to intercept another argument brewing between her two friends.

"Now, now, Fredwienie," Sam taunted with hooded eyes and a smirk. "Don't get..._testi_..." And she actually chuckled as she said that.

And they were off...

Carly and Melanie exchanged defeated looks across the room as the verbal assault erupted between Sam and Freddy and they both felt like pet owners trying to keep their pit bulls apart at the vet office.

"You're _real_ funny, hell spawn!"

"You're a little _cocky_, Fredwardo!"

"Ugh! Enough with the _groin_ jokes, demon!"

"Next time, do a better job protecting the _boys_ and I won't feel the need to ridicule you!"

The door burst open and the big beefy mall cop that put them in here looked in with his big beefy face and snapped at them in his big beefy voice: "Quiet! All of you! I don't want to hear another word until your parents get here! Got it?"

"Oh, suck a -" Sam started.

"Sam!" Carly quickly cut her off, chastising the blond with a slap to her left arm and a glare that could burn holes in steel. They were in enough trouble without Sam making it any worse. Not that it was entirely Sam's fault that they were here, but she was a contributing factor. Well, actually, she was more like the catalyst. If only Sam was a bit less impetuous. Carly sighed. But, then, she wouldn't be Sam.

The door was shut again and the four friends fell into silence. Carly laid her head on Sam's shoulder as the blond wrapped her left arm around her shoulders in a hug, drawing them closer together. Sam kissed the top of Carly's head and nestled her cheek in her soft brown hair. "Sorry, Cupcake," she whispered.

If only Freddy had not tried to assert his manhood.

Carly turned her face up to look at Sam and reached her left hand up to touch the swollen purple shiner forming on Sam's left eye. She was amazed that a shot had made it through her normally ninja-like defenses. Then again, Sam's attention was less on fighting and more on saving someone's posterior at the time. Carly's fingers traced the scrapes and abrasions along Sam's cheek and jawline, moving to thumb the small cut at her chin, gliding down Sam's neck to her right shoulder, down along her arm to her hand resting in her lap. She cradled Sam's hand in her own and rubbed her thumb over the cut and bruised knuckles.

She had never seen Sam fight like that before. Sure, there had been skirmishes at school. But, she had never seen Sam fight with such tenacity and ferociousness, had never seen her tackle five guys simultaneously. And jocks, at that. She was like a rabid junkyard dog the way she had torn into them, like a hell cat. In the end, it took everything that Melanie and Carly had to pull her off the last guy as Sam knelt on the boy's chest and hammered his face with her fists while the loudmouthed jock did his best to cover the head with his arms.

Carly never saw a guy cry so hard or run so fast.

"You got yourself some right hook, there, Benson," Sam grinned, but her tone was not depreciating. Instead, she actually had a respectful admiration in her voice.

Freddy raised a cautious eyebrow at the demon blond. "Yeah? Thanks..." he drew out slowly, skeptical but appreciative.

Sam chuckled: "Next time, though, don't lead with your nutsack..."

"There it is," Freddy grinned, shaking his head and wincing at the action.

"Seriously, Freddy...," Sam continued, her voice going low and adopting a sincerity that made Carly give her an odd look as this was an unusual side of Sam to be shown even to Freddy. "You gotta lotta balls...um, I mean...way to grow a pair, dude..." Then, she ruined the moment by smirking.

Carly had to laugh to herself. The absurdity of Sam trying to be sincere while unintentionally insulting Freddy. It was like Sam was hardwired to subconsciously poke fun at their nerdy friend. She buried her face into Sam's neck and allowed herself to smile into her blond curls.

"That was..um...very...," Freddy stumbled of his words, trying to find some that connected to what he was trying to say.

Melanie tried to help: "Sensitive?"

"Un-Sam-like," Freddy amended. "But, yeah. Sensitive..."

There was a long moment of silence until Sam snorted, unable to restrain herself. "Much like your McNuggets..."

"SAM!" Melanie and Carly chided at the same time.

They all shared a laugh together which eventually faded away as they remembered the rather serious predicament that they were facing, sitting in the mall security office holding room and waiting for their parents to come and collect them. The laughter died away until silence engulfed the room like a vacuum.

For a time it remained quiet, unbroken until a loud woman's voice exploded in the outer room: "You let my Fredward out right now! He's far to delicate to be confined in a jail!"

Sam erupted in laughter and Freddy, Melanie and Carly all looked at her in shock.

"Well, this _is_ fun!"


	18. Is There Something I Should Know

"This isn't tiring you out or anything, is it, cupcake?"

Sam was being her usual sarcastic self as they sat under a tree in the park, cross-legged, knee to knee, their fingers intertwined between them. Carly knew that her blond trouble-maker was getting bored. As much as her Sammy enjoyed being this close and just breathing in each others air, there were times when she would be happier to actually be _doing_ something.

It seemed like they had just sat down in the park by the playground a few minutes ago. Carly looked up at the nearly cloudless blue sky of a Seattle afternoon and realized that the sun had traveled too far west for it to have been only a couple of minutes. Maybe more like an hour or two. She smiled. There was always a timelessness whenever she was with Sam.

A heavy sigh from her blond brought Carly's attention back to Sam and she saw her looking over at the hotdog vendor on the other side of the park with longing. "How can you _still_ be hungry?"

Sam slowly turned to look into Carly's soft brown eyes with confusion. "How can you _not_ be. We only had three burgers."

"No," Carly laughed. "_You_ had three burgers. _And_ extra large fries, supersized shake, two cherry cheese pies, and a half pound of turkey jerky you_ discovered_ in the bottom of your backpack...that you haven't used since we left school...six weeks ago...Sam, ew!"

Sam grinned. "A light snack, at best. And that was two hours ago," she added in her whining tone. "I'm still _hungry_."

"Well, you can wait until we get back home for supper," Carly chastised with a smile.

Raising an eyebrow, Sam said: "Your place or mine?"

Carly rolled her eyes. "Kinda the same place lately, don't ya think?"

"Yeah," Sam agreed slowly. "But, I can do naughty things to you at _my_ place," she finished with a dark grin.

A blush painted the brunette's cheeks. On the odd occasion that they went to Sam's house, usually to check on her mom and clean up, they had the place to themselves and spent much of the time in Sam's bed. Or the couch. Or the carpet. Or kitchen. Or – oh, you get the point! Sam was a very creative girl when she needed to be... And, having the place to themselves meant that Carly could be vocally uninhibited. And _oh my_ how she discovered how vocal she could be.

Carly swallowed. "Well, we're going back to _my_ place, then. I have something...," Carly scrunched her face in thought for a moment, "...Spencer's doing a special supper for us..." She left it at that.

Sam narrowed her eyes as she tried to figure out her girlfriend. She suspected something was up. "Why," she drew out slowly.

Carly shook her head and stood up. "Never you mind, Miss Puckett. You'll just have to wait and see." She pulled the blond to her feet and leaned in to give her lips a long, slow kiss, tasting the salty jerky still on her lips and tongue, tasting very much like Sam.

Sam enjoyed a long public display of affection in the middle of the park with her girlfriend and held Carly tight against her, tilting her head up a bit to receive her lover's lips. Her tongue played against Carly's while her hands pressed into the small of the taller girl's back. Sam thought that a better idea would be to take this back to _her_ place and see if Carly could hit a higher octave.

After another endlessness, Carly broke their lips and leaned back, still firmly in Sam's strong grip. She studied the face of the shorter blond. The black eye was still very prominent, but the scrapes on her cheeks were healing.

"Are you sure that Spencer's over being mad at me?" Sam asked.

Carly rolled her eyes. "Oh, Sam. Spencer was never really mad at you."

"And Freddie's mom?"

"Um...yeah, well, Freddie's mom was kinda mad at you...," Carly frowned. "Your mom took it well, though."

Sam shrugged. "Yeah, well, I came out on top."

Carly gave Sam an amused look. "You have an odd relationship with your mom." She gave Sam another peck on her lips. "Freddie was glad you were there..."

"Yeah," Sam scoffed. "Right."

"Hey, if you hadn't been there, those dumb jocks would have really hurt him," Carly said with sincerity.

"If I hadn't been there, those asses would never have picked a fight," Sam answered back. She laughed a little and shook her head. "I still can't believe our little Fredwardo grew a set and took on three jocks just to defend your honor."

Carly batted Sam's arm. "Your's too, Sam! They were calling us _both_ rude names. I just didn't expect that Freddie would be the one to jump to our defense."

Sam took Carly's hand in hers and started walking back to her mom's car. "Yeah, I was kinda amused by that, too."

"Amused?"

"Hell yeah!" Sam laughed. "It was like watching a traffic accident happen. It was great!"

"Yet, you stepped in to stop it...," Carly added.

Sam shrugged. "They started kicking Fredwiena's ass..."

Carly grinned: "See? I knew you liked Freddie."

"No," Sam shot back. "But, only _I_ get to kick Fredifer's butt. I had to step in to defend my territory." They walked up to the car and Sam got out her keys, unlocking and opening the passenger door for Carly. She walked around to the other side as Carly leaned across the seat to unlock the driver side door for Sam, and she slid in behind the wheel, starting the car and putting it into gear.

"So," Sam began as they drove back to Bushwell Towers. "Why the special meal?"

Carly gave Sam a pensive and very nervous look as she thought for the millionth time about what she wanted to say to her girlfriend. About the many ways that she had run it through her head over the last couple of days. About something she needed to say after the incident with the jocks that day at the mall. About the way they had made her feel about who she was, who Sam and she were. The lewd comments that made her feel degraded. And mostly about how Carly did not want to be looked at as just a sexual fantasy of boys.

"Um...we...I... There's something we need to talk about..."


	19. This Won't End Well

**A/N: Okay. So I'm sorry it too me so long to update this fan fiction. I hope you like it. The reason I'm delayed is that I am working on a webshow project we are expecting to pitch to Jennette McCurdy later this year. Its an edgy fast-paced comedy about a pirate online radio station and the kicker is that all of the parts will be played by Jennette. So stay tuned because we are hoping to convince all of her fans to convince her to take a serious look at this unique project. So, that is what has been tying me up late at night...oh, yeah, and the Olympics...**

**Please Enjoy:**

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* * *

**"This won't end well."

Sam readjusted the necktie that Carly had insisted she wear with her dress clothes to their private dinner downstairs. Again. It was pink and blue stripes and stood out against the black silk blouse her girlfriend had laid out for her, along with the black nylon stockings and black dress slacks which had all been waiting for her on Carly's bed.

Carly had insisted that she go straight up to the bedroom. Her excitement was derailed when Carly had added the fact Sam was to have a shower. While she was cleaning away the daily grime from her body and wondering why she was alone under the cascade of warm water, Carly had laid out a new outfit for Sam to wear. There had been a note left for her, instructing her to remain in the bedroom until her escort came to collect her.

There was a little mystery and a lot of buildup going on for this dinner. Carly was prepping her to receive a delivery of something important. Something that they needed to talk about. Sam was amused by the formality of it all. She could think of only one reason to get all gussied up for an intimate dinner and they were nowhere near an anniversary.

Wait.

Sam paused in thought, hands still on her tie. Her eyes moved around the mirror as she checked her internal calendar, wishing that she kept that thing more current.

Nope.

Sam continued a final adjustment of the know of the tie, satisfied that she had not forgotten an important date. That, however, did not explain all of this formality for an intimate dinner with her girlfriend.

She returned to the bedroom and sat on the edge of the bed. She slipped her nylon feet into glossy black flats and tapped her toes together, absently.

_You don't break up with someone after going to this much trouble. Do you?_

Sam slowly shook her head to clear away that frightening idea. As much as she was unfamiliar with how these things were done, she was pretty confident that Carly had something else up her sleeve. She had been acting cagey since they left the park and had refused to elaborate on what this important thing was that she needed to tell Sam.

Something this planned out was in the works for days. A sudden fear crept into Sam's chest and she felt that this whole thing may truly not end well.

There was a knock at the bedroom door. Sam got up from the bed and went to the door, hestitating a moment before opening the door to a brunette nub in a formal black tuxedo.

"Miss Carly Shay requests the presence of Miss Sam Puckett in the dining room," Freddie spoke with a gentle formality, offering his right elbow to her. "Please allow me to escort you downstairs."

Sam chuckled softly to herself. "You are such a nub, Freddie. But, a well-dressed nub." She hooked her left arm through his proffered elbow and allowed him to lead her down the hall and down the steps to the main room. "So...wanna spill what's going on?"

"Not even if you threaten to break my arm," Freddie admitted with a grin.

"Oh, Mama wouldn't _threaten_, Fredifer," Sam smiled, jostling him with a soft hip bump as they reached the bottom off the stairs.

The main room was lit by dozens of flickering candles with soft music played in the background as Sam was guided to the dining table which was romantically set table. It was set with fine white china and crystal goblets with gold trim, silverware, a scrolled black iron candelabra and rose petals scattered about the white table cloth.

Standing at the far end of the table was Carly.

Sam's breath caught in her chest as she took in a candle lit brunette goddess. Her dark hair was pinned up and away from her slender neck, her face made up with blood red lips and an orange-brown eye shadow. The neckline of her floor length royal blue gown plunged to between her small bossom, displaying smooth white flesh. The gown managed to catch Carly's slight curves. She was simply gorgeous.

"Hello, Sam," Carly greeted in a low and husky voice, her red lips curved in a smile. "Join me for supper?"

Sam worked her mouth but failed to make any noise emerge. Her girlfriend was far too stunning for words.

"Freddie?" Carly indicated Sam's chair at this end of the table with the wave of her hand.

The tuxedoed dork moved behind Sam and held out her chair for her to sit. Sam blinked at it a couple of times before understanding that she was being offered the seat. Freddie helped her to tuck into the table and then went over to help Carly sit down. Then, he stood off to the side.

Sam felt absolutely lost. This was so far out of her comfort zone. She was unfamiliar with the nuances of fine dining.

"Carly," Sam finally said, as she found her voice. "Carls. I...um...wow! You look like a glazed ham at Christmas!"

Carly gave a little laugh at her lover's version of a compliment. "Thanks, Sammy. You can really turn a girl's head."

Sam frowned at that and slowly looked at her right fist in curiosity, trying to remember the last time she had thumped another girl in the head. Then, she beamed at Carly. "Yeah...I got a mean right hook!"

Shaking her head slowly, Carly thought: _Only Sam..._

"So...what's for eats?" You may be able to dress her up, but Sam will always be Sam. "I'm starved enough to eat something Fredifer's mother would make."

"Hey!" Freddie began.

"Freddie," Carly warned.

"Sorry," Freddie quietly apologized and went back to being silent.

Sam looked between the dork and the doll and raised an eyebrow.

Carly called out to the darkened kitchen: "Spencer, you may serve the soup."

And, so it began. The soup came first, some sort of crème dish. Sam wondered if the soup was symbolic and she recalled her monster-soup nightmare when Carly was dating Griffen. Whatever. It tasted good. Maybe she thought too much. Her head was starting to hurt. Must be lack of food. Sam spooned the soup up fast. Jeeze she was hungry. Sam paused just long enough to look behind her to make certain there was no monster.

Carly slowly shook her head, just glad Sam managed to keep any soup off her blouse.

The main course was roasted ham. Sam devoured her plate in moments, leaving orphaned baby potatoes and carrots abandoned in her wake. She was feeling unsatisfied and frowned at the vegetation. She was more a meat eater.

"Spencer?" Carly asked as more of a silent instruction.

In a moment, Spencer emerged in tuxedo from the kitchen and exchanged her hamless plate for one teeming in slabs of steaming pig. Sam looked up at Carly and smiled. God, how that girl knew her so well.

Soon, they came to the dessert. The main course had been cleared away. The candles had burned down halfway and Sam was starting to get impatient.

"Carls," Sam began. "I appreciate the dress up dinner and all, but there was something that you wanted to say to me. Is this all to soften me up for some bad news or have you suddenly come into a lot of money?"

Carly tilted her head and looked strangely at Sam, as if considering something. "How about if we have dessert first?"

Sam watched his girlfriend for a few minutes. She set her lips in a thin line, not pleased about the delay. The lifted the napkin from her lap and dropped in onto her empty plate, getting up from her seat and moving around the table to Carly. "No," she said quietly. "Not yet."

Spencer appeared at that moment with a silver domed plate which he set before Carly. Carly looked up at Spencer with a curious look, but he only flicked his eyes at Sam. Carly shifted her gaze over to Sam who was standing beside her at the table. Confusion dominated her features.

Sam nodded at Spencer who lifted away the silver dome to reveal the plate beneath. Carly looked from Sam to Spencer and then down at the plate and locked eyes on the glittering diamond ring set on the reflective surface. The setting was small, the band silver, but what it represented seemed so big.

Carly turned to look at Sam and found her lowering down to one knee. Tears suddenly leapt into Carly's eyes and her breath hitched as she suddenly understood the significance of the ring. She felt giddy and sick all at once as her belly fluttered. She felt hot and cold and her skin felt goose fleshed.

Sam took the ring from the plate and took Carly's left hand in her own, holding the ring against the appropriate finger, staring up into wet brown eyes that stared back with boundless joy and expectation.

"Carly Shay," Sam began, trying to keep her voice from breaking. She paused to blow out a long breath, ready to take the leap. "Carly. Carls. Carlotta...cupcake..."

"Sam," Carly sighed with a touch of impatience. "I think we have established who I am."

Sam nodded absently. "Will you do me the honour and...um..." She furrowed her brow and looked back at Freddie.

"Privilege," Freddie prompted.

"Sam looked back to Carly's eyes. "Yeah...privilege...of one day...um...oh, fishsticks! Carls, would ya just be my wife?"

Carly's tears flowed freely down her cheeks and her right hand covered Sam's. She smiled brightly. "Oh, Sammy...How...This is so...I planned this so differently..."

Sighing heavily, Sam chuckled: "Carls, not to hurry you or anything, but this really isn't a comfortable position." She groaned and shifted her weight over her knee.

"Sorry, babe," Carly grinned. "Yes. I meant to say yes! Of course, Sammy. I'm yours for life!"

Sam slipped the ring onto Carly's slender finger, shaking her head in amusement. She stood up and Carly suddenly launched herself out of her seat and threw her arms around Sam's neck, pressing her lips firmly onto the blonde's. Sam gripped Carly at the waist and tried to breathe around the stranglehold on her neck.

Sam broke the kiss and looked into Carly's wet and happy eyes. "So..." she drew out. "You had something to tell me?"

Carly laughed.

"Sammy, how did you set this up? I had it all planned out completely in secret?"

Sam shrugged. "I'd like to say that it was my super sharp ninja observation skills..."

Carly looked skeptical.

"...but maybe Spencer let something slip when I asked him what up with the penguin suit..." Sam finished, sorry she ratted out Carly's brother, but...yeah, she didn't really care. "You know how I hate to be surprised..."

"What? Wait! You _love_ being surprised!"

Sam smiled. "Yeah, but I needed something cool to say."

"Yeah, that was so not it," Carly grinned.

"Goofball..."

"Cornball..."

"Congrats, guys!" Freddie beamed at them.

"Yeah!" Spencer joined in, wiping away a tear. "That was just so...so...oh, I need a moment..." And he ran off into his bedroom.

Carly looked back at Sam. "So, where did you get the ring?"

Sam laughed with raised eyebrows. "Funny story about that, Carls..."

Carly frowned and slowly shook her head. "Oh, this is not going to end well..."

* * *

**The end? Maybe? Should I continue? Has this fic run its course?**


	20. Instinct

**An update. Something short. A segue maybe. Hope you like it.**

* * *

"You sure make life interesting, Puckett..."

Sam turned her head to look at Carly who was watching her with worried eyes as red and blue lights danced everywhere around them. As much as her brunette fiance tried to put on a brave face, it was in her eyes that the facade crumbled and Sam saw the terror and fear brewing with nervousness and concern, despite the thin lipped smile she was showing the blond.

"C-Carls," Sam tried to choke out, but was having a hard time forming the words. In fact, it was a struggle just to keep her eyes open and all she really wanted to do was close them for a few minutes and sleep. Yes, she thought that sleep seemed like a good idea. Just a few minutes, yes. It was easy to just let her lids relax and slowly come together. Hrmmm. Yes. Very nice. Except. Except for the noise. Someone was yelling. Why was someone yelling? She didn't want to listen, just sleep. But, they kept yelling. What were they yelling. anyway? Her name? And someone was shaking her. So, annoying. Sleep was right there. Right. There.

Sam fluttered her eyelids open with great struggle and came eye to eye with Carly's face an inch from her, her face red and tears running down her cheeks. She was yelling and shaking Sam's shoulders which was bringing a growing discomfort from somewhere lower in her torso. Probably what woke her up. That and the fact that Carly won't shut up and let a girl sleep.

"Carls..." Sam croaked again, her voice a weak version of itself. "I...I love you, girl..."

"I love you, too, Sammy!" Carly cried, way too loud. "Just hang on, okay?"

Sam furrowed her brow. "Carls...would you...would you shut up...so I can get...get some...sleep...?"

Carly was shaking her head. "No, baby. You can't go to sleep! Stay with me, Sammy. You have to stay awake for me... Can you do that, Sammy?"

Sam let out a heavy sigh. Ooh! That hurt! Ugh. She felt miserable. And tired. But, Sam forced herself to stay awake only because it was somehow important for Carly that Sam stay awake. Even though she was sooo tired. Sam would do anything for Carly. "Kay..." was about all that Sam could manage, feeling her eyes drooping again.

"Sam!" yelled Carly.

Sam's eyes snapped open. "Anghn..." she grumbled, as pain flooded her body. She became aware of the dancing lights again. "Is there a party?"

Carly frowned. "No, Sam. No party. Do you know where you are?"

_Urgg...questions..._ Sam groaned. She tried to look around, but it was really difficult to turn her head. There were red and blue lights everywhere. The windscreen was shattered. The passenger airbag had deployed. Carly was on her knees on the seat beside her, face to face. She felt the brunette's hands on her face. The steering wheel was against her left cheek. She was in a car. A car. Oh, yeah, there was an accident. "I'm sorry, babe..." she managed to get out.

Carly was shaking her head. Tears erupted again. She was on a crying jag, sobbing out words: "Sammy...no...it's okay...it's..."

Then, there were hands on her other side. People were touching her. People she couldn't see. Something was being forced around her neck. She was being eased back in the seat. Pain seized her body and she voicelessly screamed out and airy gasp and Carly's hands were on her, soothing her, holding her. Something hard was against her back. There were other voices. A man and a woman. They were asking stupid questions, too. Of course she knew her name and where she was. Jeeze. She was just having a hard time forming words.

Ouch! What the hell? Someone was poking her wrist, but the neck thing kept her from being able to look down. Wow, her arm was feeling funny. Warm. Numb. And she was getting droopy again. Sorry, Carls. Can't do what you want. Trying. But...hard to...think...

Things started fading for Sam, like someone threw gauze over her face. She wasn't sure if she slept or was just dangling on the edge on consciousness.

Sam opened her eyes, slowly, as if waking from a deep sleep. Deeper than any she had known before. She focused her eyes on the closed door to a hospital room. She blinked away the sleep. Sam turned her head to the right and found a pair of wet brown eyes staring back at her, silently watching her with love and concern. The same eyes that she had seen when she had fallen asleep, but without the fear and terror.

"Sam," Carly gasped, gripping Sam's hand in a vice grip with both of her hands. She stood from her chair and sat on the side of Sam's bed, leaning in and giving the blond's lips a long kiss. Sitting back after a few moments and cupping Sam's cheek in one hand, never letting go of her lover's hand with her other hand.

Sam slowly grinned her carefree, wry grin. "Aww...you were worried..."

Carly let out a half sob and a chuckle, shaking her head. "Never do that again..."

"I'll never leave you, Cupcake," Sam said, far more seriously than she meant to sound.

"I know."

After a moment of silence, Sam cleared her throat. "Are _you_ okay?"

Carly nodded. "Thanks to you. Just a couple scrapes and bumps. It could have been a lot worse."

Sam frowned. "Thanks to me you were _in_ an accident. I am...I...Carls, I'm soo sorry... I'm..."

"Shhh," Carly hushed, putting a finger to the blond's lips. "It wasn't your fault, Sam. The other guy was drunk. It was him that crossed to _our_ side of the road. If you hadn't turned, it would have been a head on collision. It would have been a lot worse for me."

Sam just stared at Carly.

Carly smiled. "The police at the scene said it was his fault. There was a witness behind us that saw it all." She paused for a moment. "They say the drunk veered into our lane and then you turned away, toward the ditch at the moment he hit us. It was so fast, I just remember the car come right at us and then the impact." Carly was quiet for a moment. "The cop said that people normaly slam on the brakes or turn into oncoming traffic to stay on the road. But, you turned for the ditch. It was so fast, they said it was reflex. There wasn't time to think, just react."

Sam slowly nodded, understanding. "Instinct."

"Yeah..." Carly smiled warmly, her eyes boring into Sam's with an intensity that words could not describe. "Your reflex was to turn to the ditch and take the impact on your door...instead of..." Carly choked up.

Sam smiled back. "Instead of your side... Carls, I'll always protect you. Even if it costs me my life, I'll always protect you."

Tears flowed down Carly's cheeks. She had no words.

Sam shrugged. "Besides, life wouldn't be interesting without you, Shay."


	21. Wherever I Lay My Hat That's My Home

**Ok. So, moving along with the plot... I have had a lot of people demanding that I continue with this story plot. When I had started this story back in Chapter One, I had no idea that it would reach this many chapters or go as far as it has. My previous stories Strange and Stranger were short glimpses into the life of a Carly and Sam relationship. So, too, had I thought this would be a brief love affair with the two characters. However, in the course of writing this, they have grown for me, fleshed out and matured. The story has developed through mini plots and developed the characters in a way I had not envisioned when I had began this scribble. I truly hope that all of my fans and readers have enjoyed the journey, are enjoying each new chapter and continue to enjoy whatever is to come. I have no idea where this is heading, no ending in sight, I'm just enjoying the ride. I hope you are, also. Many thanks to all of the fans who are loving this fiction.**

* * *

"Wherever I lay my hat, that's my home."

Sam flicked at her ball cap sitting on the small, round table at the Starbucks on Pike and 3rd, next to the window. She looked out at the world on the other side of the glass.

The weather had changed to colder, damper days as Seattle was transitioning into winter. The people shuffling along the sidewalk were wrapped in their coats and scarves and wool hats, bundled against the cold and lost inside of their own little worlds. She looked up at the gray clouds blocking the sky and it seems like forever since the sun had been visible. She stared down at the near empty Colombian dark roast warming her hands.

Her gray-green eyes matched the weather, as did her mood. A long, heavy sigh escaped her lips and Sam seemed to deflate into her chair.

Where had the time gone, she wondered to herself.

She had awoken today and discovered that she was a nineteen year old with her own small studio apartment in the city and a job and that all of her years of youth were becoming a fading dream.

It had been a fun time of her life. Hanging out a Carly's, tormenting Fredly, eating endless amounts of ham from her girlfriend's fridge, doing iCarly. It was a carefree time when the world belonged to the three of them and anything was possible. Even falling in love with your best friend and having her return that love and never worrying about labels or definitions.

Carly.

God, how you missed that girl. Gone now for almost four months. Three months, three weeks, two days and seven hours. Sam had to give her head a slow shake. She was such a nub.

Carly.

Nineteen and well into her busy first year at Princeton on the other side of the country.

She had left for school in mid August. Her bags loaded onto Freddy's new car. A teary farewell for them all. Well, teary for Freddifer and Carly. Sam didn't cry. Sam never cries. At least, not that anyone but Carly would ever see and she wasn't going to lose it for her girl on their last day together. Sam was sad. Devastated. Her heart ripping from her chest like someone was scooping out her insides. Even as Carly gave her that final hug and left for the East Coast, she didn't cry.

Sam had waved until Carly had vanished down the road and around the corner and Spencer had wandered back into Bushwell Towers and Sam was left alone in the quiet parking lot.

That was when Sam cried.

She had cried a long time, no longer needing to be Carly's stoic rock. The strength the brunette had needed to stick to her decision to go to the New Jersey university and pursue her dreams. To leave her fiance back in cloudy Seattle.

Sam realized that her world had been gray since that day.

As the weeks went by, their ritual of daily calls and texts and diminished to emails, texts and the occasional call each week to weekly contact through text and email and meaning to call but not having the time to random and infrequent contact. It had been two weeks now since Sam had last heard from Carly.

Sam stayed true to her promise. She texted Carly at least once a day and sent her love an email wrap up of her day every night. If Carly was swamped with school and university life, Sam made sure that she would always be there in digital support, a part of Carly's life in some small significant way.

And Freddy would drive down to see her from his Boston film studies every Saturday like clockwork, checking on Carly and giving her a physical link between them all. And he would record a brief nerdy vid clip from Carly and send it to Sam. But, car issues had kept Freddy from making his routine visits for the past couple of weeks and Sam could only imagine how stressed and disappointed Carly would be about that. She would be going nuts.

A cold and dark rain began to fall and wash the streets in black water, sending the people scurrying for shelter as Sam gave an amused grin for their sudden discomfort and sipped at the remains of her coffee.

Things had changed in her own life here in Seattle. After the summer had ended, Sam had moved out of her mother's house and into her own studio apartment above a Chinese restaurant in which she had found full time employment as a server and occasional cook. Spencer had offered her Carly's room, but Sam had felt it was time to find her own place in the world. A room of her own.

Spencer had been depressed over this, but at least understood her motivation. It was time that she grew up a little.

Her bed was still the loneliest place to be at night. And there were too many nights that she had chosen to curl up on the couch instead of the half-empty bed, hugging a cushion and wishing that it was her flesh.

Her own place. A job in a restaurant. Not the exciting world of higher learning and future dreams that her two best friends shared. But it was her world. She just didn't know what she wanted for herself. Her life had always been Carly and without her, she had become lost.

Until fate had brought her a new path and she had been asked to guest on the new iCarly webshow. An appearance which renewed her interest in that show. An interest that she had thought had been left behind. So, she had begun to help out with planning and shaping the show in her spare time. She was their consultant. And this, in turn, led her to doing some writing and set up work. She helped with the technical aspect with tips that she had learned from the nub and stuff he talked to her about over the internet chats they shared some nights. Apparently, film school was not as tough for him as Princeton was for Carly... Nub.

Her work on the new iCarly segued into becoming the Executive Producer.

iCarly had grown a lot from the days that Sam and Carly camped it up for their viewers. The new duo had grown an international audience in the millions. And these fans were loyal and wanted more. But, iCarly stayed true to its roots, continuing to film from the loft studios, still mostly live and still very random. Networks had bombarded them with offers to go commercial, stuff it with advertising and market it to pablum fed audiences. Sam had told them where to stick it.

The fans demanded public appearances. Merchandising. Copies of old shows. Fan clubs. And the fans were willing to pay to for it. Sam was overwhelmed.

Then, Neville showed up. Bane of the iCarly gang, the foppish adolescent had grown into a foppish young man. But a young man with a mature craftiness and a new hatred of all things corporate. With his help, Sam had formed the iCarly show into a production company, protected by copyright and generating a steady revenue from merchandising and fan appearances. The revenue had paid for the production costs and appearance expenses. And it left them enough to pay themselves a comfortable income. Modest by entertainment standards, but enough to cover Sam's rent and basic expenses. Enough that she could leave her day job and do what she had found made her very happy.

She began to understand what made the nub tick.

It was just weird to be friends with Neville who still had a tendency to call everyone by their first and last names. Except for Sam. Sam he called Blondzilla. And she liked that.

Sam shook her head, amazed that she had transitioned from a lazy and disinterested teen to a busy and connected young woman. She felt as if she had grown and matured very quickly in a very short time.

But, time still seemed to drag on without Carly around. What was only a handful of months had felt like years. A lot had changed in that short span. Three young lives that had been so tied to each other had split away on three separate paths.

Too bad your teenage years couldn't last forever.

Sam drained the last of her coffee and absently fingered the empty cup in her hands.

She thought back at endless days of school with Carly, the laughter and tears. The easy way that they had lived life. The nights of nothing but hanging out, watching television, the Groovie Smoothie, doing the webshow. Late night conversations in the dark, in Carly's bed. The hugs. The touches. The kisses. The love.

So much love. So much fun. Tucked away in the recesses of adolescent memories.

Sam was jarred from her reverie when a fresh cup of coffee was placed in front of her, the aroma of Colombian fresh brew filled her nostrils and she abandoned her empty cup for this new one. She looked up at the unexpected person who was helping themselves to an uninvited seat across from her at the table and Sam blinked.

"Hey, beautiful," the uninvited woman began, in what she probably thought was a sultry come-hither voice. "You come here often?"

A slow, radiant smile spread across Sam's face and her eyes danced with light and moisture. Then, a hint of confusion clouded her face as she wrinkled her forehead. "You are a long way from home," Sam said.

The woman shrugged in her thick dark blue coat and grinned: "Home is right here. Right now."

Sam smiled again, pleased to see her, but was still concerned. "Why aren't you at school, Carls?"

Carly continued to grin, put her elbos on the table, leaned in and rested her chin in the cradle of her palms, staring into Sam's brilliant gray-green eyes.

"Funny story about that..."


	22. You Take A Piece Of Me With You

"Don't throw your life away for me, cupcake."

Carly played with the almost full coffee cup in her hands, her thumb flipping up the edge of the lip and her finger snapping it back down again, lost in Sam's voice, so content to hear her speak. Sam's voice soothed her and made her feel happy and warm. She felt safe and comfortable.

Snapping fingers waving before her face grabbed Carly's attention and she had to blink away her absent thoughts and stare curiously at Sam.

"You awake in there?" Sam was saying, a slight smirk on her face when she realized that it had been a one-way conversation the past few minutes.

Carly smiled. "Sorry, Sam. I was...enjoying myself..."

Sam raised an eyebrow. "With what?"

"Listening to you..."

Carly had a dreamy look in her eyes, that smokey satisfied look she always had after... Ahem. Yes, well. "You have exams coming up, don't you?" Sam asked, trying to steer this conversation back on topic.

Carly pouted. "You don't like seeing me?"

Rolling her eyes, Sam chuckled lightly: "Cupcake, I'm _always_ glad to see you. I'm just trying to find out what you are doing here when you are supposed to be hard at work learning journalism stuff."

Carly shrugged and looked around at the sparse people sitting in the coffee shop. Her eyes fell again on Sam's grey-green eyes. "Guess I just missed you too much to concentrate."

Sam opened her mouth to speak, but was cut off by Carly. "It's not for me, Sam. I thought it was, but it isn't. I don't really belong there anymore. University, I mean. It's all deadlines and stress and no time for any fun." She reached out and touched Sam's hand with her own. "And you aren't there to make any of it make sense." Carly paused and looked deep into Sam's eyes, trying to will her to understand. "I felt lost."

"But..." Sam started to say, confusion painting her face.

"Not. For. Me," Carly repeated, slowly, forcefully, with finality. "I found out that there really wasn't anything that they could teach me that I didn't already know. Sam, I loved doing iCarly. I loved writing to fans. I loved doing all that stuff for our show. I don't need an overpaid professor to tell me how to do it better or different or the way everyone else had done it. I want to do it my own way. You know?"

Sam slowly nodded, understanding. Independence. She could accept that. "But..." She started to say again.

"Sam, I hated it there," Carly admitted. "Every minute of every day. I missed your face. I missed your voice. I missed your touch."

"Melanie..." Sam began, but was cut off again.

"That just made it worse, Sammy. Melanie looks like you, but she isn't you and that made me miss you all the more. And most of the time she was busy with her own studies and problems. I didn't get to see her very much. So, I had to come home, Sam. I had to drive all the way across the United States to my heart and home. To where I belong."

Sam tilted her head to the side, her hands abandoning her cup to hold Carly's hand in both of her's. "Carly..." Sam began and stopped.

A silence fell between them.

Carly creased her forehead. "What, Sam?"

Sam shrugged. "Um...sorry. Was getting used to being cut off..." She smiled as Carly smiled and she thought that it was good to see her cupcake smile and the radience of that smile removed all gloom from her mood. "Ok. I appreciate the fact that you missed me, Carls. I can totally get the hate-school thing. _Trust me on that one_... But, how did you get here?"

"You always hang out here on Saturdays, babe," Carly said, as if that was well known by everyone on the planet.

"I mean...you were on the other side of the country. _Please_ do not tell me that you travelled all this way alone." Sam could never have been thought of as a worrier, but where Carly was concerned, she could be very protective. There were a lot of bad things that can happen to a woman travelling alone across the country. It would kill her to think that any of those things could have happened to Carly.

"She didn't travel alone, Samantha," came a familiar voice from behind Sam. A voice attached to a mirror reflection that took the seat between Carly and herself.

"Oh, look. Other me," Sam growled, pretending to be irritated by the appearance of her twin.

Melanie just swatted Sam's arm, laughing. "Twit. Be nice."

"Don't wanna...hey, wait a minute...why aren't _you_ in school?" Sam said with a forceable stare at her sister.

Melanie shrugged. "Couldn't let Carly come all the way back here on her own, now, could I? What kinda sister do you think I am? Besides..."

"Let me guess...university wasn't for you either?" Sam groaned, feeling like the only responsible person at the table and that fact disturbed her to no end.

Melanie laughed lightly. "Yeah...something along those lines..."

Sam stiffened in her seat. "Wait a minute! Neither of you have a car. How..."

Someone took the other seat at the table, dropping heavilly into the chair with a large coffee in hand and a red ball cap on his head and three days worth of beard growth. "Hi, Sam..."

Sam relaxed and sighed heavilly with an eye roll. "Of course. Fredifer. Go figger."


End file.
